


between the lines

by lachesisgrimm (olga_theodora)



Category: Star Wars Sequel Trilogy
Genre: Arranged Marriage, Attempted Murder, Beardlo, Cats, Dark Fairy Tale, Darkish Rey, Depression, Don't copy to another site, Eventual HEA, F/M, Fantasy AU, Hurt/Comfort, Loneliness, Magic, Pregnancy, Things are not as they seem, alternating povs, are those horns I see, braiding as a love language, brief mention of a past miscarriage (not rey), canon age gap, definitely talk of babies, essentially friends to lovers, getting to know you via letters, my version of rey palpatine, one shared brain cell your honor, the cat is fine and thriving, weirdly cottagecore at parts
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-09-17
Updated: 2020-11-15
Packaged: 2021-03-08 02:34:43
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 10
Words: 33,435
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26518300
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/olga_theodora/pseuds/lachesisgrimm
Summary: …but on these long winter days, when everything in sight is so gray, I am immensely cheered by Osmer. Playing, sleeping, hunting- he is a puddle of sunshine that never goes away.I wish, sometimes, that life were less small.Ben travels to Exegol to meet his betrothed, and things do not go as planned.
Relationships: Rey/Ben Solo | Kylo Ren
Comments: 621
Kudos: 464
Collections: Reylo Halloween Collection





	1. a princely arrival

**Author's Note:**

> Part one of my spooky season offering! 
> 
> As ever, if you think I've missed an important tag PLEASE let me know (this goes for all my fics, btw).

Chandrila was a small kingdom, as such things went- small, but with rich land and picturesque views, and a common destination for poets and painters interested in the pastoral. It had been ruled by the Storm family for over a hundred years, largely peaceably, and its young king (who was not interested in starting meaningless wars for the sake of added acreage around the border, or in raising taxes to pay for a flotilla of luxurious pleasure boats) was considered promising by shepherds and lords alike. 

There were three children in the house of Storm, though the dowager Queen had birthed only the youngest: Finn, who had ascended to the throne at the tender age of twenty after an unexpected heart attack had carried away his father (and after his mother had declined to rule alone, preferring instead to keep a seat on her son’s council and see to her charitable endeavors). His two brothers- Poe, and Ben- had been adopted by the royal family after a plague and scuttled ship, respectively, had left them both orphans. 

One year- long before Finn ascended to the throne, when they were all still boys thwacking each other with wooden swords and stealing tarts from the castle kitchens- an offer of marriage came from Exegol for a crown princess still so young that the birth announcement (accompanied by news of the Empress succumbing to puerperal fever) had arrived only two months before. 

“Any of your sons,” the ambassador said with a faint sneer, as if barely resisting the urge to mock the concept of children not related by blood. “Pick one blindly; the Emperor cares not. If you send your heir the kingdoms will be merged, if another you strengthen our alliance. You may throw whichever of them you please into the Princess’s bed once she comes of age, provided you send troops now to defend our borders against Nal Hutta.”

“I do not care for his phrasing,” the Queen huffed later that evening, once tucked under the blankets on the royal bed. “She’s just a babe, and Exegol is so… cold.”

“Powerful, though,” her husband mused, equally ill at ease with the offer. “And if Nal Hutta manages to take Exegol-”

“Which they might.”

“They might.” He sighed. “Then we are next.”

Nal Hutta, after all, had swallowed Yavin and two other small kingdoms over the past two decades. Exegol was an ambitious target, but not an impossible one. 

They agreed to the offer, and after careful consideration chose Ben, who had all the makings of a fine ruler and who would likely molder away in the dustiest corners of the library researching ever more arcane topics unless he were given a true, solid path in life (or so they told themselves, and with no little guilt- but what were they to do, with war staring them in the face?). 

The war lasted five years.

Ten years after that, the first letter arrived from Exegol.

Five years later- almost a year before the Princess’s twenty-first birthday, when the marriage was due to take place- the letters stopped entirely, though nearly a dozen left Chandrila in the months after, all in Ben’s exemplary calligraphy. 

“Perhaps she’s ill,” Poe ventured when he caught his brother staring glumly at the stacks of envelopes tied with green ribbon. “Preparing her trousseau. Shy, with the date so close.”

“I-”

Ben nudged the stack lightly with one fingertip. “She’s… witty,” he mumbled. “A friend. I enjoy her letters.”

“Well,” Poe said after a moment’s pause, “soon you’ll get to enjoy that wit in person.”

And a mere month later, accompanied by his uncle (the Duke of Calrissian), a retinue of guards, and many wagons of goods, Ben traveled to Exegol to be married.

\- - - 

_I have spent some time inspecting your portrait, but portraits so often lie- perhaps you are much more stern than your letters and that half-smile imply, and I will find you a hard task-master as a husband. I warn you, sir, that I am not one to sorrowfully sigh away; life has given me many opportunities and I have not yet succumbed._

_I must end this letter here, as Osmer insists on trying to hunt my quill and has already left several blots of ink on the parchment._

\- - -

Ben came to an unfortunate realization over the course of five days: he hated his betrothed. 

The first day, he had blamed his own travel-weariness. The second, shyness on both their parts. The third and the fourth, their ever present and smothering chaperons- but by the fifth, he could not longer shunt aside his overwhelming feeling of betrayal. “She is not who she claimed to be,” he hissed at his uncle in the relative privacy of their rooms, prickles on the back of his neck and racing down his limbs. It was the unseasonable chill in the air, he knew; the dark wood and ancient stone of Exegol’s palace seemed to be in a constant state of winter, regardless of how the sun blazed outside. “She is-”

“She was _presenting_ herself in a good light,” Lando muttered in return, though there was an apprehensive cast to his expression. “And may yet be more than she appears.”

Ben added another log into the fireplace, raising sparks. “I’m beginning to suspect she made a lady-in-waiting write her letters. I asked after Osmer, this morning-”

“Who?” Lando sat in a nearby chair in one elegant movement, planting one elbow on the arm. 

“Her cat. She sniffed and said that cats were best kept in the cellars,” Ben said in disbelief. “‘There are no pests in _my_ room, my lord’,” he mocked, shaking his head and dropping with far less care into the chair opposite Lando. 

“He probably ruined one too many dresses and she banished him to the stables,” Lando replied with a roll of his eyes. “And I wouldn’t be surprised if she _did_ foist off her letters on another lady; I doubt she’s ever handled a quill for fear of ink spots on her fingers.”

“She raised him from a kitten.” Frowning, Ben stared into the flames. _A more pathetic mite you’ve never seen,_ she had written nearly four years ago. They had passed from stiff and formal phrases, by that point, but that letter- exuberant, and filled with charming sketches in the margins of a kitten with paws far too large for its small frame- had been the first to truly show him what lay under the polite exterior of Exegol’s heir. He, in return, had told her stories of the horse he had raised from a colt, and their friendship had been sealed. “She’d never get rid of Osmer.”

“The lady raised him from a kitten, then. Likely she left the Princess’s service and took the cat with her.” Lando shrugged. “She’s pretty, Ben. That was no lie, at least.”

She did look like her portrait- dainty and blonde, with startlingly blue eyes- but that was cold comfort. “Pretty, but petty,” he stated baldly. “Cruel. One of her maidservants ran past me weeping outside her solar, a fresh bruise on her face. I would rather find the lady.”

There was a long silence, after that statement, and Ben knew exactly why Lando’s gaze turned sad and sympathetic. “My boy,” he murmured, “Exegol owns you.”

“Exegol _owes_ Chandrila,” Ben shot back, though unconvinced himself. 

Lando considered him, chin propped in one hand in a rather uncharacteristically casual pose. “No war,” he murmured. “But ill-will. Trade would suffer. If Kamino moved on our borders-”

“When have they ever?”

“Just because the current Queen is peaceful doesn’t mean the next will be.” Lando lifted one shoulder slightly. “The Emperor is all but on his deathbed, Ben. A year, maybe two, and you’ll be in control.”

“With a wife who beats her maids and only cares that farmers pay their tithes, regardless of weather or circumstance.” Ben bent forward, head in his hands. “Finn’s parents ruled together, Lando. My mother, when she was alive, ruled the duchy while my father acted as steward. Poe’s parents had much the same arrangement.”

“And you want to- what? Count cows and shocks of wheat?”

“I want to _trust_ my wife,” Ben shot back bitterly. “I want to work hand in hand with her, and not worry that she’s… she’s whipping the serving girls, when my back is turned.”

It was odd, the way the palace felt. Odd how he could be in his supposedly private rooms, an honored guest, and feel as if an executioner eyed him from one shadowy corner. He could not sleep comfortably, in Exegol; he kept waking in the middle night feeling half-smothered. “I would not be able to wrest power from her,” he added quietly. “Not without becoming cruel and hard myself. There is no softness to her at all.”

Lando dragged in a breath. “Marriage alliances are often fraught, Ben,” he murmured after a moment. “Finn himself is… is anxious about his own future spouse.”

“He’s met Rose.” Ben raked a hand through his hair, annoyed. “We’ve all met Rose. She’s better than he deserves, as Finn himself would admit.”

“True, but there is a difference between admiring one’s betrothed and living with one’s betrothed.”

“And now I no longer admire her.”

Ben’s quiet admission had Lando slumping into his seat, eyes weary. “It was a gamble.” He sighed, rubbing a hand over his face. “Nal Hutta would have been a worse fate, Ben. If they had taken Exegol they would have taken us, along with countless lives.”

“I know,” Ben murmured. “I know.” He gathered his courage. “I still have to… to sleep with her. Forever.”

Lando’s gaze softened. “Worried about a blade in the night?”

“Yes.”

And more than that. There was a vulnerability, to stripping off one’s clothing and embracing another person. Ben enjoyed the act of bedding, but not enough to treat it in a cavalier manner- and not enough to risk babes born on the wrong side of the blanket, which he had somehow dodged thus far despite a few reckless encounters. 

_It’s not kind,_ his father had told him- and his father, once a bastard son of a dairymaid, had a very personal view on the matter. _Pleasure is good, Ben, but not at the risk of anyone else. There are lives in the balance. Your own hand is your safest partner, outside of marriage._ And then his father had grinned in a sad, crooked way, shaking his head. _Sometimes even then._

Ben had been barely old enough to comprehend the lesson, at the time, but he had remembered that bit of wisdom throughout the years, and he remembered, understood, that his parents had been faithful to each other. Even after (as Lando had once let slip, in his cups) his mother had endured a life-threatening miscarriage following his own birth.

“Separate bedrooms.” Lando folded his hands in his lap, legs stretched out in front of him. “And locks, my boy.”

\- - -

_… and then, of course, I woke to a decapitated mouse on my pillow. Osmer has definite opinions on many things, including me placing very nice hats on his head._

\- - -

“Sugar, my lord?”

“No, thank you.” 

They were at an impasse, Ben and his betrothed, but to his despair she seemed amused by the fact. Her sleeves, edged in trailing lace, fluttered as she passed him the delicate tea cup. “You look cold, my lord.”

“The palace is-”

Ben considered his words. “-possessed of very thick stone walls.”

The tea, when he sipped it, was already cool. 

“Yes.” That mouth he had once considered wistfully ( _friendship can turn to love,_ his adoptive mother had told him more than once, and he had allowed himself to believe that) curled upward. “Safety, my ancestors thought, was more important than comfort.” Raisa tossed her head a little, curls bouncing. “And comfort can be bought.”

“Your rooms are warmer, I hope,” he replied stiffly, and her smile turned dangerously dazzling. 

“You will be very cozy in _my_ rooms.” Not his intent but the trap he had walked into, and he could feel his skin heat with a prickling blush. “The best in the palace, as you’ll learn.”

“I was merely asking after your comfort,” Ben managed. “I apologize if I sounded… forward.”

“Soon, it won’t matter.” She sipped her own tea, hardly seeming to care what temperature it might be. “We are practical in Exegol. Hardy. I have sacrificed more than you could imagine.”

Raisa- dressed in silks, her hair caught up with pearls and her hands smooth- looked as if she had never endured a day of hardship in her life. _A scratch from poor Osmer?_ he thought uncharitably. _One winter night with four blankets instead of five?_ “It is a monarch’s duty to sacrifice themselves for their people,” he said finally. 

Her smile- like the walls, the atmosphere, the expressions on every person he passed- was cold. “I’ve sacrificed enough, my lord.” There was an edge to her tone, and it was knife-sharp. “I intend to enjoy myself.” 

Raisa picked up a small, iced cake, as he watched, and nibbled at the edge. “You’re ready to rule, my lady?” Ben asked, feeling rather as if he stood on a precipice. 

Her eyes glittered. “I am ready to _take._ ”

 _Locks,_ Ben thought with a chill, _may not be enough._

_Poe would be better equipped to deal with this._

\- - -

Exegol had extravagant dinners, games, and very finely dressed courtiers. It also had farms in desperate need of repair, too-skinny chambermaids who eyed him askance, and stewards with frayed sleeves.

“All things you can fix,” Lando would whisper to him after feasts and spectacles, as if it were not becoming more and more clear that Ben had been brought to Exegol to provide royal stud service. “Give it some time. Sway the lords and ladies with kindness.”

The lords and ladies, who took their example from Raisa, her insufferable cousin Armitage, and the Emperor himself. Ben could not avoid the first two, who seemed to delight in making him uncomfortable, but the Emperor preferred to keep himself apart. Ben saw him nearly every evening, presiding over the court like a particularly observant and venomous spider, but other than an insultingly brief welcome on arrival he had never actually spoken with the man. 

“I could be anyone,” Ben groused one night when he and Lando sat before the fireplace, wine in hand. “He looks at me like something disgusting he stepped on in the stables. _Raisa_ watches me with a smirk, as if she’s already plotting the hunting accident that will likely take place after she gives birth to an heir.” 

“After the spare, surely,” Lando tried to joke. 

“I might not survive the month. They may carve out my heart in some kind of blood rite the moment you return home.”

“They may,” was Lando’s flatly spoken and dispiriting reply.

And then, nearly a week before the wedding, a message came: Lando’s son had been injured, and gravely enough that he must return home at all speed. “Go,” Ben told him, despite the flare of panic and fear he himself felt at being left alone in a seemingly hostile kingdom. “You have to go, Lando. I would never forgive myself if I made you stay and the worst came to pass.”

“My boy,” Lando murmured in his ear during their final embrace, “I expect to receive many, many letters in your own hand- because the moment you stop, we will be coming to find out why.”

A well-meant but hollow promise, Ben suspected. There would be diplomatic inquiries, of course, but nothing more. It would be unacceptable to start a war over one lost adopted prince, though he wished-

He wished, if he did leave behind a child, that it could be raised anywhere other than Exegol. 

He wandered, after the dust from Lando’s retinue settled, and no one attempted to stop him. An hour of meandering brought him to the south tower (“Haunted, or so the servants say,” Armitage had once said with a laughing sneer), and on impulse he took the winding stairs up. A ghost, when he thought about it, sounded like much more pleasant company than the strangers surrounding him- and though he saw no signs of lingering spirits, he was a little startled to see signs of actual neglect past the first landing. He had never yet entered a room in the palace that had not been scrubbed within an inch of its life, but here was dust and floating spider webs and floor after floor of furniture that appeared to be shoved haphazardly into place with no attempt at organization, as if the poor servants sent on the errand had dropped each table and chair in the first possible place and left at a quick trot. Arrow slits, rather than windows, lined the stairwell at precise intervals- and at the top, after losing track of how long he had been spiraling toward the sky, he found a thick wooden door, slightly ajar. 

He stepped inside, boots leaving visible prints in the dust covering the floor, and immediately felt… stifled. 

Lonelier than he had been even seconds before. 

_Known._

Moving past a table holding a treatise on botany and a mug of unidentifiable scuzz, he made his way to the grimy mullioned windows. The glass was bubbled and nowhere near as fine as that elsewhere in the palace; when he attempted to open them he was only able to move the hinged panes a bare inch before they were caught on some unseen mechanism. Enough to let in air, to catch a small glimpse of the world below, but not enough to truly see. 

There was little else, in the room: a bed with rumpled covers, a wardrobe with two well-made if plain dresses inside, a shelf of books in topics ranging from history to diplomacy to military maneuvers. A lock on the inside of the door- simple and shoddy- and a far more intricate lock on the outside. 

“Two keys,” he mused in a murmur, feeling the sudden itch to leave, as if the supposed ghost might swing the door shut on him. Carried by two different people, in all likelihood. Whoever had lived within the room had been under heavy guard- a political prisoner, perhaps.

Or a princess. 

_I’ve sacrificed enough, my lord,_ Raisa had said. Had she spent part or most of her life in this room, locked away even after the threat from Nal Hutta had passed? Had she grown hard and odd in her time alone, her letters only a vivid fantasy of who she yearned to be? 

Had Osmer ever existed at all, or had she made him up in a fit of boredom?

Thoughtful, he returned to his rooms and re-read every single letter, one after another and long into the night. 

\- - -

_…but on these long winter days, when everything in sight is so gray, I am immensely cheered by Osmer. Playing, sleeping, hunting- he is a puddle of sunshine that never goes away._

_I wish, sometimes, that life were less small._


	2. the survivor, crownless

_We were utter scamps, I’m afraid, but respectful ones. Our worst crime was barreling through drying laundry and accidentally pulling the sheets into the mud, for which we were apprenticed to the laundresses for an entire week. By the end of the first day we all had a new and lifelong respect for those who keep us in clean clothing and fresh bedding (and Poe was, temporarily, a lovely shade of lavender due to an unfortunate interaction with the blueing vat, for which I was not responsible)._

\- - -

There were some days when the sprawl of open space outside her door was too much to manage. Too wild, too open, too dizzyingly large. On those days she would sprint to and from her cottage to milk the goat and feed her chickens, after which she would bolt the door and huddle in front of the fire with Osmer pressed against her ankle, feeling as if she might shake out of her skin.

On other days, her cottage turned from cozy to confining, and she spent every waking moment in the brisk air, listening to the distant crash of waves against the cliffs and scavenging for additions to her stew-pot. Those were better days, even when it rained; courting an ague was an almost defiant pleasure compared to what she had once known. Being alone was nothing new, but freely wandering wherever she chose? Still so novel she could hardly believe it. 

“It’s been years since I last was able to enjoy weather,” she confided to the chickens, who clucked broodily in reply. “I remember… I remember that little garden…”

Roses. She had pierced herself on more than a few thorns. Thick, twining hedges. Weeds she had pulled faithfully, after Nurse had given her lessons on _this is a good plant, this is a stray strangling the good plants._

She plucked weeds grudgingly in her own vegetable and herb garden. She let those strays thrive everywhere else, and the goat seemed to enjoy them. Good plants and strays, meant and trespasser- Raisa-

 _Rey,_ she thought fiercely every time her mind brought up the name she had answered to for as long as she could remember. _I’m Rey._

The cold, clipped _cheap to procure, and easy enough to bury_ invariably flitted through her mind at such a thought, and on days when she could be outside she threw rocks until she tired. On days she could barely stir from her fire she brushed her hair and wept- not because the tangles hurt (though they did), but because-

Because. 

Freedom was a wild, terrifying thing, but at least she was somehow alive to appreciate the uncertainty. 

\- - -

_Berry pie. That is my favorite dessert._

\- - -

Her days, when ghosts did not chase at her heels, were very ordinary. She fed her goat and chickens, she baked bread and cooked her meals (improving, finally, after practice), she tended to her chores, she cautiously scried the capital. Her skills there were haphazard, but she could usually gather enough information to calm the rapid beating of her heart. Soldiers were not moving toward her. No one was moving toward her. She was an island, as she had always been, and would always be. 

And then one day- a good day, for her, cheeks pink with reluctant enjoyment and belly full of eggs and good greens- she spotted him. 

In retrospect, the fact that she had been given his actual miniature was a little puzzling, though perhaps they hadn’t wanted her to enthuse over the wrong hair color or features in her letters (had her other not wanted to write them?). It didn’t matter, really- context alone, even within her shaky scrying skills, told her that the dark-haired man was Prince Benjamin of Chandrila. Hers, at one time, and the sight of him bending over the hand of her blonde other made her instinctively hiss. 

Osmer ( _First of his name, mighty hunter of rodents,_ she had once written, back when she could still smile) twined around her ankles, mewing plaintively. The image shimmered away, allowing her to drop to her knees for a good scritch. “What do you think?” she asked in a confiding murmur. 

Osmer rolled to his back, curling a warning set of claws against her hand- not enough to scratch, but enough to tell her his patience was limited. She carefully withdrew, settling on the floor with a grunt. “Mine,” she muttered tentatively, pressing her face to the threadbare cloth at her knees and considering the word. _He should have been mine._

A warmth tingled in her fingertips- a not unfamiliar feeling, since her exile- and she perked a little, glancing toward Osmer. “She’ll ruin him, you know.” Not that Rey had ever met her other, but the look in that woman’s eyes- that, at least, was familiar. “He’s sweet.”

Osmer’s eyes half-closed, all lazy and soft. 

“I could take him.” Spoken aloud, the idea took shape. “I could-”

 _Abduct him?_ some other part of her mind scoffed. _Make off with a prince, start a war, mire him in your little cottage and- and what? Demand your betrothal rights?_

“What a beast that would make me, Osmer.” 

His tail twitched. She remembered Ben’s kindness, those dark lashes, that sweep of shining hair… a lock of which he had sent in the second-to-last letter she had ever received. It had been in her pocket the night she fled.

And- reluctantly- Rey thought _perhaps,_ the first real feeling of greed in her life taking root deep within. 

\- - -

_My parents were faithful. I realize this would render me laughable in any court- and perhaps you may laugh- but my parents were faithful, and they loved. I look for the same._

\- - -

“I can’t,” she told her chickens, while thinking _they stole from me and I will steal from them._

“It would be immoral,” she told the goat, even as she remembered pressing her face up against the small gap in one window, watching midwinter fires burn far below.

“It would be selfish,” she muttered into Osmer’s fur, and made a face when he wriggled away to settle at the far end of the bed. “But have I ever been selfish, Osmer? Even when I thought I was-”

 _A nightingale,_ her grandfather had said right before one of the guards had buried a quarrel in her side. _When you are just a plain, useless sparrow._

Her fingertips were warm, again. Rey lay back against the lumpy mattress, staring up at the dim ceiling. “I was Raisa for twenty years.”

And surely that was worth _something._ Surely acting as bait for twenty years was worth more than hiding away in some secret castle or convent or wherever they had stashed their precious _nightingale._ Surely twenty years of being paraded around at a distance, a veil over her hair and in full view of an assassin’s arrow, was worthy of payment. 

“Not a sparrow,” she murmured with a sneer, drawing the blankets up over herself. “A cuckoo.”

Osmer shifted at the end of the bed, as if tired of her self-indulgent maundering, and she half-buried her face in the pillow. “A year and a day,” Rey whispered to herself. “I can ask for that. A small price, for everything.”

So she gathered the herbs. She ground them into a paste, murmuring her own desperate wishes, she trickled a circle of precious, stolen salt. 

Her first effort left her with an unbearable, blinding headache, and only Osmer’s claws and wailing had forced her to crawl into the relative safety of the cottage to collapse in pain onto the floor. She was unsure how much time passed, in that state (she ate stale bread and sipped warm water, she used the chipped chamber pot, she pushed aside Osmer’s gory contributions) but when she next again scried Ben wore more than the beginnings of a mustache and beard and looked quietly despondent. She couldn’t hear his words, but the scene she saw- him lounging in a fireside chair, an older man nearby- spoke of familial affection and a deep, deep worry shared by both. 

Rey allowed the image to dissipate, sitting back from her bowl of water with a frown. What had bloomed from fear and rage and pain nearly a year before had come with no explanations, no instructions; everything she did with the magic that roiled inside of her was by instinct and instinct alone. Magic had allowed her to flee, wounded and weeping. Magic had guided her to this small, abandoned holding, far from the capital and any other gathering of people. Magic had allowed her to filch from the castle larders from a distance, and to steal her chickens and goats from the castle flocks and herds in the exact same way.

The chickens had refused to lay for weeks, after their unexpected abduction. The goat had been more sanguine about the experience. 

“I think,” she said aloud, not even flinching when Osmer appeared from seemingly nowhere to lap at the water, “my mistake was expecting a spell that fetched a goat to also fetch a man.”

He was far larger than her poor nanny, after all, and she hadn’t been trying for a particular goat at the time, just one of many. 

Thoughtful, and refusing to give up ( _a year and a day, I’m owed that much at least,_ though what she would do with him was still in question), she sought out the lock of hair tied with gold ribbon. Smoothing one finger over the silky smooth strands, she considered her options. 

Perhaps, she decided, a choice could be offered. A sop to her own conscience. 

\- - -

_There is nothing for me here. Poe will be Master of the Guard (he is suited to the task, and to cheerfully charming most into keeping the peace), but my parents once laughed that leaving me alone would mean me spending a decade researching cheese mold, and they were right. I need more than whatever academic subject captures my mind- I need goals, and routine, and someone I can care for._

_Osmer is nearly four years old, as I count it. A young gentleman. Please give him a dish of cream on his natal day with my regards._

\- - -

She had walked in dreams once, accidentally, and in doing so had nearly gotten entangled in the nightmare of an ewe a mountain range away. _I didn’t have a target, then._ Oils on her temple and pressure points and utterly unsure if the herbs affected the process at all, Rey settled back against her pillow, ignoring Osmer’s judgmental gaze. _Now I have one._

Lock of hair clenched in one fist, she cast herself out. 

_Cold._

_Her tower had always been cold, even with the fire lit. There had been a time, once- before the tower, before Lady Primt- when she had had a cozy nursery and a loving nursemaid, but that was so long ago she scarcely remembered the layout. She slipped past her blonde other (one fingertip under a man’s chin), past her supposed grandfather (a chess board in front of him, caught in check-mate), past a multitude of guards and walls and shadow-eyed servants._

_And then- him. Sleeping, and to slip into his dreams was an easy, easy thing. He shivered as she did so, his head leaning into the ghostly palm pressed along his cheek- and then she was in, and cozied against his side in a forest grove. He held a thick book in his hands, bent toward the words, but at her touch he looked up and blinked._

_His gaze did not once shift from her face, miracle of miracles. “Lady.”_

_He sounded exactly as she had always imagined: voice deep and honey-sweet, and as soft as velvet. “Do you know me?” she asked, wondering what his answer might be._

_“Should I?”_

_A bruising response, but not unexpected. “I once sent you letters.” She could feel his lock of hair in her fist, but it was insubstantial compared to his dream warmth. “About myself, and Osmer.”_

_His head bent toward hers. “Osmer?”_

_“And you told me about your horse, Hestes.”_

_Ben’s gaze softened, lips curving up into a smile. “Raisa.”_

_She felt a pang, at that, but leaned her head against his shoulder nonetheless. “Would you come find me, Ben? Find me, and- and stay?”_

_His arm curved around her, and it had been so long since anyone had voluntarily touched her that she sucked in a breath, blinking back tears. “Find you?” he asked in a murmur, as if he had just been given the key to a great quest._

_Rey lifted a hand, pressing a single fingertip against his full bottom lip. “Your choice,” she whispered, and the dream ended._

\- - -

_The nature of our roles is to be penned in, but I realize that it is worse for you. Princes are given so much more freedom than princesses._

\- - -

Rey sometimes thought on her childhood, and always did so in the form of a tale. 

Once upon a time, her shoes had been sturdy. She had toddled along garden paths, chasing after blue butterflies- one of her earliest memories, along with her kind nursemaid and the taste of cinnamon in porridge. It was her own private garden, to go alongside her own private suite, and child Rey had never questioned her nursemaid’s fanatical devotion to pinning a veil over her brown hair before pulling back the curtains every morning. 

“For your protection,” Nurse would say, checking the pins before letting her loose. “A distinct shade, your hair.”

(It wasn’t until after her traumatic shift, after she had learned to scry, that Rey understood her hair had been the _wrong_ shade- that hers had darkened, or her other’s had lightened in the year after birth. 

It didn’t matter. There was a grim delight in allowing her long, tangled hair to flow freely as she tended to her animals and plants, though no human would ever see the color.)

Child Rey had always been held at a distance. She had been able to see, far off, the courtiers and guards and servants, but they had been a mere sketch of the world, and her nursemaid had told her tales and taught her letters and numbers and intercepted the silent, faceless beings who brought water and food and laundry. Child Rey had tried to creep outside the door, once, and had been swatted soundly for her troubles and given only bread and water for three days. 

Nurse had cried, to do so. Nurse had also moved stiffly that first day, despite her bright hair barely touched by age, and it was only years later that Rey had wondered if it had taken more than mere orders to make Nurse comply. And when Nurse had gone away (teary-eyed, Rey barely nine) she had smoothed a tender hand over her braids, murmuring “You carry a heavy load, my darling. Take a different path, if you find it.” 

Rey had hoped in the years since- particularly after finding her cottage, after _knowing_ \- that her nursemaid had found a quiet home of her own, somewhere, and not an early grave. 

It was easier, after Nurse, to recount the facts in a very plain, quick way, as if rushing through the inconsequential middle of a story.

Nurse had left, and Lady Primt had come. 

There had been no more cinnamon nor sugar. 

Osmer had appeared, thanks to a furtive maid Rey had met only a handful of times (and what had happened to _her?_ ). 

There had been a new threat to her person, and she had been escorted to the tower in the dead of night. “For your own safety, Princess,” they had said, and she had believed it, until days had stretched to months which had stretched to years.

Letter after letter had been sent away (and she had been cautious, and she had been cheery, and she had been _ladylike_ ). Letter after letter had come, and because Lady Primpt had told her in blunt, crisp words exactly what Ben would be to her Rey had read every line with intense scrutiny. The hand that formed his penmanship would one day hold hers, the words so clearly inscribed on parchment would one day be whispered into her ear. Years of letters had transformed him from a cipher to a breathless hope (because he would let her leave the tower, surely), and then-

_We have to flee, Princess._

_They are at the gates, Princess._

_Only what you can carry, Princess._

She had never regretted, not once, grabbing up a sleepy Osmer from his perch at the end of her bed. 

She had, however, more than occasionally regretted not trying to stuff Ben’s letters into the pockets of her dress and cloak before they hurried her away. 

\- - -

_In my part of Chandrila, the act of braiding was common with family members and loved ones. You likely have any number of skilled maids, but- if you do not mind- I would like to occasionally braid your hair. Even if only for a garden stroll._


	3. a simple tale

_I am not allowed to run, you see. As my perpetually prim governess often declares, such behavior would be risking the royal head. My head does not feel particularly royal, but perhaps she sees something I do not. When you arrive, you must tell me if anything about my brow or hairline is at all majestic._

\- - -

He woke the morning after his visit to the tower feeling… odd. As if he were running late for some appointment and needed elsewhere, and yet- 

_Where would I go?_

Muzzy from too little sleep, he blinked out at the gray dawn, the hour so early that the servants had not yet come to tend to the fire. Ben remembered- distantly, vaguely- warmth against his side, and freckles over the bridge of a woman’s nose. A dream, surely; it had been years since he had last dallied with anyone, ever since the moment nascent fondness for Raisa had begun tainting every encounter with vague feelings of betrayal. 

At the thought of Raisa he dragged himself from bed to the basin, splashing his face with cold water and cursing under his breath. Taking in harsh, ragged breaths, he faced himself in the small mirror and remembered his decision from the small hours of the morning: he would give her time. 

He had been too hard on her, he had sleepily concluded after re-reading every letter. The sweet, bright woman who had written him couldn’t possibly be a construct; Raisa was merely in need of an adjustment period after what appeared to have been years of horrific mistreatment. He would be kind and patient, and once accustomed to her new life she would settle into someone far more likable. _I do recommend courting your wife,_ his adoptive mother had counseled him before leaving home. _Even as fond as you are of each other. Allow yourself to love, Ben, if you can, and give her time to love you in return._

Wise words, and he had taken comfort in them after finally blowing out the candle and slipping into bed- but in the light of day, that comfort seemed thin and desperate.

Still. He would _try._

“I,” he began quietly as he broke his fast beside Raisa, “visited the south tower, yesterday.”

“I’m aware.” She sipped at her tea, looking almost amused by his admission. “There is little you do in Exegol, my lord, that goes unnoticed.”

“Are you having me followed, Princess?”

“No need.” Raisa lifted one shoulder in a delicate shrug. “The servants know when to keep their mouths shut and when to pass along information. Did you meet our resident ghost?”

She did not sound like someone discussing a place of former imprisonment; she barely seemed to care. “No ghosts, but an interesting room at the top. It appears someone once lived there.”

“Perhaps.” She looked as if a joke rested on the tip of her tongue- a bitter one, even- but her gaze was clear and direct, unshadowed by memory. “Not the most convenient of quarters for anyone save a hermit.”

“I had wondered,” he ventured carefully, “if you might have resided there, at one point.”

Raisa’s smile was humorless, and then and only then did her eyes show the kind of bruising that spoke of long torment. “I spent my youth in a convent, my lord. I was brought to court only a year or so ago.” She broke a corner off a pastry, crumbling it between her fingers. “My education was… rigorous.”

“Your letters-”

“I believe,” she interrupted in a tone sharp enough to cut, “that you would do well to forget anything I ever wrote in those letters. I’m sure you can understand that a child in need of diversion might elaborate on the truth.”

Except, as Ben well knew, the princess had often been spotted by visiting diplomats, nobles, and scholars. Never introduced- the Emperor had always been clear that her safety was of paramount importance, and had once said something along the lines of keeping her apart to preserve her unspoiled, maidenly innocence- but paraded at a distance by nurses and tutors. An odd arrangement, but most royal courts did keep to the idea of children being seen and not heard. 

_Perhaps she was visiting, at the time?_ he tried to convince himself. _Perhaps-_

But could she fake liking him? Ben could have sworn that her affection in the letters had been genuine, but there was no hint of that friendship in the woman sitting beside him, nor was she even trying to be somewhat polite about the lack. She acted (and he was failing miserably, he knew, in his quest to be kind and patient) like a woman who would grimly set herself to the unpleasant task of getting an heir the moment they were married, up to and including binding him to the bedposts if he expressed a wish to sleep alone. 

A far cry from the wedding night he had tentatively hoped for, one where they might both be somewhat shy of the other but a level of trust existed. One with laughter, even, as they explored what pleasures might be found in the marriage bed.

“If that is what you wish,” Ben replied with polite, veiled disappointment, “then I will do exactly that.”

After- Raisa sweeping away saying something about a last fitting to her wedding gown- Ben took refuge with a small clutch of older gentlemen discussing the year’s potential crop yields. Lords, but minor ones, and while their eagerness to bring him into the fold was clearly based on hopes of future favors he could hardly blame them. These men, with their ink-stained fingers and worried eyes (intrigued by new agricultural methods, and weighing the risks of implementing them), cared more for their tenant farmers than most, even if only out of sheer necessity. 

He was listening as one man fretted over difficulties in draining a marshy field when a page appeared at his side, wide-eyed and a little breathless. “The Emperor would see you, my lord,” he said in a tumbled rush that silenced every soul within hearing. “Immediately, my lord.”

And what could he do, but agree? “Then I will come at once.”

The Emperor was a mystery- or his current state was, at the very least. Chandrila’s diplomat to Exegol had described the situation in detail, in their reports: only a year or so before the Emperor had been fit and hardy, for his age, only to suddenly fall prey to a wasting disease. 

_I would scarcely have believed it was him, save for that very particular cruel twist to his mouth,_ Ackbar had written with unusual candidness, his words encrypted by a code Ben himself had devised. _Either he will be dead in a month, or some witchery is afoot._

And yet he lived, still, and Ben wished that Ackbar had not asked for his very deserved retirement and retreated to his holdings on Chandrila’s coast. His replacement, a young man named Dopheld Mitaka, was someone Ben barely knew and could not safely confide in. 

The Emperor’s private quarters were well-guarded, luxurious, and- curtains firmly drawn, despite the brightness of the day- lit only by candle- and firelight. Ben waited near a fireplace fully large enough to roast an ox, hands clasped behind his back. 

His host’s voice (cracked with age, and filled with some dark, obscure amusement) was unexpected. “Ah, our young prince.” The Emperor should not have been able to sneak up on him, and yet there he was: seated in a plushly upholstered seat that Ben could swear had been empty merely seconds before. “I knew your grandfather, you know- your actual grandfather.”

Ben bowed deeply before replying, exactly to the degree required for their respective stations. “I was not aware. Thank you for your invitation.”

“He studied in Exegol, before his marriage. A very clever young man.” Palpatine regarded him attentively. “I had hoped to raise him high in my court, but your grandmother snared him instead.”

“A love match, I’m told,” Ben said after a brief pause, and the Emperor chuckled. 

“An act of thievery, my boy. She came for a wedding and left with one of my best scholars. Stealing you from Chandrila has a kind of symmetry, even if it was by chance.” His hand curled around the elegant top of his cane, eyes glimmering. “You have questions, according to my Raisa.”

“A few,” Ben responded carefully, and was treated to another laugh that sparked unpleasantly along his nerves. 

“Shall I tell you the story of Emperor Plagueis the Wise? It is not a story they would tell you outside of the kingdom.” Palpatine gestured toward a chair, and when Ben sat he nodded a little. “A simple tale, really, and I will keep my recounting brief: he discovered a way to keep his loved ones from dying.”

Ben knew when a response was required, and he offered it as gracefully as he could. “I am eager to hear.”

“He had many children, you see, and assassins took all but one. So he looked at his last, precious daughter- a mere five years of age at the time- and made a difficult decision. His spymaster stole a child from the slums who looked close enough, and installed her in the luxury that was the royal nursery, secreting the actual princess away to a far-off castle.”

Ben, who had read a fragmented version of the tale years before (and had considered it a sad, possibly false narrative, because the source had been suspect), kept his face straight even as his heart raced. “And?”

“And the pretender had every comfort for four years, until a bribed cook slipped poison into her soup. But that princess- my great-grandmother- lived to the age of sixty-one.”

“An odd story to tell a future bridegroom.”

“Not when it is your inheritance.”

Pretending no longer made any sense. Ben let the silence draw on, before breaking it in full knowledge that his own death (at a cost; he would carry off as many attackers as possible) might come quickly after. “Is this a confession?”

The Emperor smiled. “Childbirth took Raisa’s mother, assassins her father- my only son. In hopes of keeping the crown within my direct line, I took inspiration from an ancestor’s example.” Knobby fingers clenched around the head of the cane. “As to your understandable concerns, I removed a small conspiracy a year or so ago. A band of traitors secreted letters outside of the kingdom and intercepted your own. Raisa’s love notes ended up in a midden, I’m afraid- though my spy managed to send you the correct portrait, at the very least.”

The words, so bluntly spoken but somehow skirting around the truth, managed to shock Ben to the core. Aware that much hinged on his response- and remembering, belatedly, that a midnight escape was still possible (east, he kept thinking, the direction like a rope cinched round his middle for no reason he could fathom)- Ben said, “So those indecorous letters came from a pretender?” 

He did not allow the sharp laugh in reply to affect his expression, not even when the Emperor said, “You cannot expect a sparrow to imitate a nightingale, princeling. Blood will tell.”

“Indeed.” Ben rose, and bent his knee even as his soul protested the very act. “She is worthy of my fidelity.” He looked up at Palpatine through his lashes in a move worthy of Poe. “Grandfather… if I may refer to you as such.”

The Emperor’s satisfaction was evident. “You may- and after the wedding, when you are truly settled, I look forward to showing you my private library. You may find your grandfather’s abandoned research very interesting, indeed.”

In the wee hours of the morning (following some secret path he had no prior knowledge of, and uncaring of the consequences) Ben crept from the castle and saddled his horse. 

His _she_ had been a matter of interpretation.

\- - - 

_The stars are lovely, when I can see them clearly._

\- - -

Ben had been trained on how to survive in a hostile environment, but Chandrila in general was friendlier than Exegol. Chandrila had a multitude of berries, greens, roots, and mushrooms that Ben knew on sight, but Exegol was just odd enough that his lessons went a little astray. 

_Careful with this one,_ he vaguely remembered a tutor saying at one point, right on the verge of his body giving in to the wrong dietary choice. _A close twin to our friendly wood mushroom, but that slightest of blue tinges will betray you._

Hestes proved his guardian. His horse clamped firm teeth on his sleeve when he stumbled, and carried him when he managed to mount. When Ben finally emerged from the haze he was so far away from any known landmark as to be useless, but that inner tug east was still in full force. 

“Do you know where we are going?” he asked aloud, and Hestes snorted in a way that sounded almost derisive. “Of course you do,” Ben said wearily, patting his neck. “Far better than I.”

The journey took days, to Ben’s understanding, but given his loss of time may well have taken longer than that. No guards followed, or none that he saw (he took odd paths, a combination of game trails and overgrown roads drawn from a mind not his own). He at last rode across a verdant moor as twilight fell, waves crashing in the distance and the smell of green and salt in his nose. 

She waited outside a stone cottage, hood pulled over her hair despite the lingering warmth of the day and the dying of the light- and she looked _surprised_ at his approach, as if he were the embodiment of every dream or nightmare she had ever had. “You,” she said in a soft hiss, and maybe she had freckles and maybe not, the dusk refused to tell him. 

Running on little sleep and stomach rumbling, he dismounted on shaky legs. “Did you call me, lady?”

Her mouth parted briefly before clenching shut, and he recognized the hand movement of someone who had a knife concealed at their belt. “You-”

Ben waited for her to continue, and she did not disappoint him. “You may not leave.” Her tone was harsh, but the thread of confusion and doubt rendered the words gentler than anything Raisa had ever said to him. “I- I claim you for a year and a day.”

Leaning against Hestes’ side, Ben considered her carefully. “Do you?”

He had left behind a crisis of immense proportions. A diplomatic web, an incentive for war (his first act of true, reckless selfishness), but the draw had been too strong for him to resist. When she didn’t immediately respond he looked beyond her toward the small stable. “I’ll start on a paddock for Hestes tomorrow.”

She blinked. “Ah.”

“I couldn’t possibly stake him with a short lead for a year and a day.” A taunt, that, but there was a kind of satisfaction to having them both on the same shaky ground. She looked so young, under her hood- young, and weary, and as skittish as a wild cat that might run or attack without notice. “May I share your table?”

There was a new uncertainty to her expression; a flicker of her gaze toward the door. “Of course.”

Ben let a long moment pass before he moved to the other side of the saddle, retrieving the pheasant he had caught by chance prior to arriving. “My contribution.”

Her expression argued that no one had ever been so kind to her before, and he had to fight the urge to draw close, to run a hand over her hair (was she blonde, under that hood?) and murmur soothing words. “Would you like me to prepare the bird, lady?” Ben asked instead, keeping his voice low and quiet.

She drew herself up with sudden irritation, snatching the pheasant in one swift movement. Her hand grazed briefly against his own. “I have _learned_ how-”

And then she froze, taking in a shaking breath. “I _know._ ”

He waited until she reached the door before asking, “Should I call you Raisa?”

It was if she wilted, for a moment- head bent forward and shoulders too, all under an imaginary whip. “Rey,” she murmured. “Call me Rey.”

And then she was gone, and he turned himself to the task of settling his horse for an extended stay.

\- - -

_I’m not sure how to act, when you come. Decorum calls for curtsies and scripted words and a very elaborate tea ceremony, but I do worry that Osmer will interrupt the proceedings with a fresh mouse, or that I’ll trip over my hem. I suppose I can count on the fact that (dare I say it) you will be bound by politeness to at least stay until the dead of the night, only to disappear from both my sight and history (until we receive word that you have married a shepherdess who is a goddess in disguise, and have settled in a palace all of gold and diamonds- which sounds horribly uncomfortable, if you ask me, but perhaps you like that kind of thing)._

\- - -

He settled Hestes for the night (there were good oats, available, and sweet hay) and fed the goat and chickens while he was at it. The nanny lipped at his coat cheekily but otherwise gave him no trouble; the chickens murmured broodily but accepted his offerings. 

The holding was old, but sturdy: a cottage, a chicken coop, a small stable. Some fencing- enough to pen in the livestock and garden, but nothing extensive enough to allow Hestes free range. He would attend to that problem on the morrow.

“What do I say to her?” he asked Hestes after the chores were done. “What do I do?”

The gelding eyed him with impatience. 

“I do have a year and a day.” And a broken betrothal contract, but every instinct he possessed told him he was exactly where he needed to be.

Hestes had no guidance on offer, nor did the nameless goat nor chickens. Ben made his way to the cottage cautiously, unsure of his welcome. There had been a known order, to his arrival in Exegol: there would be a wedding and a bedding, and presumably an heir in due time. A pleasant task, back when he had considered his future bride the woman who had written _I look forward to not being alone._

The basic expectations had been set, with Raisa. Rey was another matter entirely. 

She whirled the moment he entered, hood still firmly pulled up over her hair and wooden spoon in hand- and Ben, before she could speak, set his saddlebags to the side of the door and murmured, “Rey.” The name was lovely on his tongue: sweet, a little tart. Her knuckles whitened even as her cheeks pinked. “To clarify- before I left the palace the Emperor said I had been corresponding with a decoy.” Ben stepped closer, wrapping one hand gently around her wrist. The spoon clattered to the floor. “You _were_ the one who penned those letters?”

She licked her lips. “Yes.”

“Good.” He offered her a tentative smile. “It was a shock, meeting- meeting her.”

“I’ve never met her myself,” Rey responded stiffly. 

“She wasn’t pleasant. What would you have me do?”

She hadn’t once flinched away from him or tried to free herself; he would have immediately stepped back if that had been the case. “What?”

“For my year and a day.” He watched as she tilted her head slightly to the side, a strand of dark hair slipping free from her hood. She did have freckles. “Chop firewood? Add a room to your cottage? Collect eggs?” There was a thin scar along the knobbly ridge of the back of her wrist, and he smoothed his thumb over it thoughtfully. “Warm your bed?”

She scowled, a flash of startled, guilty surprise in her eyes, but instead of jerking away leaned in. “And if I wanted that?”

“I promised to be gentle.” And he had, once- in delicate terms, during their last year of correspondence, when she had admitted (in equally delicate phrasing) to being a little afraid of the marriage bed. “And I promised not to leave- so if you want that service from me, Rey, be prepared to see my graying head on the pillow next to yours for years to come.”

He had the sense that a blatant proposition or grope would have shocked her far, far less. “You can’t mean that,” she whispered, and there it was again- the urge to cuddle her close and nuzzle at her hair.

“Think on it.”

Then- at just the right moment, when she looked liable to cast him out into the night from sheer nerves- a cat appeared from the shadows to wind around his ankles. With true relief Ben looked down to meet gleaming amber eyes, feeling as if he were meeting an old friend. “Ah,” he murmured, releasing her wrist to kneel and offer a scritch. “Osmer.”

And Osmer, his ally, purred.


	4. an unreachable sky

_I still wear my grandmother’s signet ring, though it fits only on the smallest finger of my right hand. I miss her, and I miss our picnics in the orchards._

\- - -

He was… large. Broad. Absolutely capable of tossing her over his shoulder and tumbling her in some pile of furs like a raider of old, a thought that made her feel odd and flushed and more than a bit needy. He knelt at her feet, one finger scratching beneath a delighted Osmer’s chin, and after a moment he looked up and met her gaze. “I was worried about him,” Ben said gently. “And you.”

“He’s a good mouser,” she said faintly, gaze moving to the glitter of gold on his right hand. “Your grandmother’s ring.”

“I could hardly leave that behind.” Ben settled on the floor, crossing his legs and allowing Osmer to sprawl over his lap. “I’ve missed your letters.”

She took a step back, and when he offered the dropped spoon snatched at it quickly. “You’re sleeping in front of the hearth.”

Was that a dimple she saw, with his rueful smile? “An excellent spot for a guard.”

“I don’t need a guard,” Rey snapped, scrubbing the spoon against her apron. “I need-”

 _I want,_ she found herself thinking, though her marital education had been odd and patchy. 

("He will raise your nightgown and take his pleasure. Best to lay still and quiet," Lady Primt had said, only to add with an uncharacteristically soft, sad sigh, "if he wants you to cry, you will know."

 _Do you expect tears on your wedding night, my lord?_ Rey had asked in her next letter, nearly biting her lower lip bloody at her own daring.

 _I expect nothing, my lady,_ he had written in return, _save honesty and trust, and if I am very good a few earnest smiles._ )

And maybe, alone in her tower, Rey had looked on his portrait, stroked that lock of hair, and felt urgings that may or may not have been wifely. Maybe she had touched herself, cheeks hot, and imagined calloused fingers doing the same. 

His fingers, she had noted during her many quick perusals of his form since his arrival, were… admirable. 

“Of course not,” he replied as her thoughts spiraled, ruffling Osmer’s fur. “Though it would be my honor to do so.”

She portioned out food for two (she would have to start stealing more flour, perhaps even snatch another hen for eggs) and settled across from him at the small table. His knees knocked against hers beneath even as Osmer yowled at high pitch, and she jostled her spoon, spattering broth. 

“All is well,” he said quietly, covering the back of her hand with his own. “You were in that tower for a long time, weren’t you?”

Rey stared down at the breadth of his hand swallowing her own. “You know?”

“I saw.”

Her sanctuary, and her prison. “Three years, give or take a few weeks.”

His fingertips swirled over the back of her wrist, again finding the scar from a guard’s whip. “I’m sorry.”

She snuck a glance at his face, finding only soft eyes and a softer mouth. “Are you mad?”

He continued to stroke, stroke, stroke, that small patch of skin seeming to feel more pleasure than her entire body had felt in a lifetime, even as his expression hardened in a way that indicated he was not entirely the gentle man who had once written to her. “Not at you.”

“But are you mad about-”

Rey drew in a breath, remembering that she could break his bones, if she chose. She could sap the life from him. She could do so many things, if he turned against her (and had done them before, in a blind and unknowing panic). “Are you mad about being _here?_ ”

There was no fear in his expression, no irritation. “You gave me a map, not irresistible orders,” he said plainly. “I could have stayed. I could have turned back at any time, if I had wanted it badly enough.”

“A map that I planted in your head during a dream.”

“Far more discrete than bribing a servant to slip it into my pocket.” He sat back, picking up his spoon with his free hand. “Chandrila made promises to Exegol, but I made promises to _you._ To my mind, the fact that the name was incorrect makes little difference, not when you thought that name was your own.”

“Oh.” He let go of her hand, and she looked down with unexpected loss, almost expecting to find her wrist irreparably marked. “Right.”

“I’ll take up hunting as one of my duties, unless you prefer the task.” His booted foot snugged alongside one of hers, leg warm even through her skirts. “I’ll need more wood for fencing, too- may my boundary extend to the forest beyond your holding?”

As if she had the precision to magically define boundaries that would hold a determined man, but maybe he had guessed that. “You may go where you please.”

“And may I kiss you before bed?”

She had just begun to lift a full spoon at that question, but managed not to drop it in surprise. 

“I believe I promised to kiss you every day,” he said in a murmur. “If you were willing. You don’t have to worry about me staying for eternity, if that is what is on your mind.”

“A kiss is a small thing, then?”

Ben smiled, slow and sweet, and in some ways that smile was more a blow than the arrow that had delved into her abdomen. “A kiss is never a small thing.”

She did not kiss him. She set the dishes aside to be washed, she gave him the two blankets she could spare, and she wrapped herself in the one remaining. 

Osmer, the traitor, sprawled loose and limp in the curve of Ben’s belly and purred. 

\- - -

_That was always my favorite part of the autumn- just myself and my brothers at the hunting cabin, fending for ourselves. I have eaten Poe’s burnt stew more times than I care to recollect (his hot cakes, however, were and are always excellent)._

\- - -

Rey woke to an empty cottage and neatly folded blankets in front of the hearth, and her first thought was _so he’s left, then._

A little heartsick, she stepped out her front door only to see, not too far off, a shirtless Ben chopping firewood in the misty morn, Osmer supervising from a safe distance. 

She had never seen a shirtless man before, or not a living one, at least. _The statues didn’t lie,_ she found herself thinking. Muscles, visible and engaged in his every move, and ( _oh_ ) hair on his chest and in a line disappearing under his breeches, as if arrowing toward a specific point. 

Ben spotted her, unmistakable eagerness lightening his expression as he let the ax rest at his side. “Good morning.”

He had, she realized belatedly, nipples. 

She hadn’t realized men could have nipples. 

Rey turned on her heel, stalked inside, and for lack of a better option screamed her inexplicable and tumultuous feelings straight into her pillow. 

The shawl she had wrapped around her hair before leaving the cottage (just in case) slipped, but no one was there to see.

\- - -

_There are some winter mornings when I find it difficult to leave my bed. It is hard to leave warm blankets on the grayest of days; sometimes I just want to dream snowy mornings away._

\- - -

She tried to step outside her door the next day, and found herself hesitating on the threshold. 

“Rey?”

Banks of thick fog were settled over the moor. An army could be poised just out of sight, and because she hadn’t scried since Ben’s arrival ( _what would he think?_ ) she would never know. 

An arrow could fly from that dense white. She darted to the left of the door, pressing herself against the wall. 

“Rey.” Ben, leaving his bowl of porridge behind, moved toward her, hands settling lightly at her waist. “Sweetheart.” He peeked through the open door, gaze darting assessingly, even as Osmer sat on the threshold and began to lazily lick one paw. “Did you see something?”

“I-”

How did she explain her fear of the open, which came and went at a whim? “I have chores to tend to inside, this morning,” she said instead, pushing at his wrists until he released her. “See to the animals.”

For a long moment he did not move, considering her with an unreadable expression. “I could stay close, today,” he said finally. “Save setting rabbit snares for tomorrow. The coop needs a few repairs; best to tend to that before predators start making off with your chickens.”

Rey gave him one jerky nod before side-stepping out of reach and scurrying toward her bedroom, where she stood just out of sight and allowed the trembling she had held at bay to work its way through her limbs.

He was true to his word. She heard the sound of hammering for most of the morning, and- with that marker of his location- she dared fill her scrying bowl and cast her power west. The images flickered with no seeming pattern, as usual: a stoic guard gritting his teeth as a lash cracked against his back, two laundry maids giggling furtively as they hung sheets out to dry, the red-haired man Lady Primt had once pointed out and called her cousin leaning against a table with a sneer on his face. Her other, face pale and sleeves indecorously pushed up past her elbows, pacing a richly appointed room and seeming to mutter to herself. 

One extended glimpse of Rey’s supposed grandfather, peering at a map with an intensity that made her breath stutter in her chest before she realized that it depicted the southern reaches of the kingdom. The border shared with Nal Hutta, not Chandrila, and given that Rey currently had their prince performing her farm chores that was for the best. 

She did not see amassing forces, nor a marching army, nor even bands of knights sweeping the countryside. Letting out a tentative sigh of relief, she let the magic slip away before pouring the water into the stew pot- and, over the following hours, found herself returning again and again to what she had seen. 

Near the end of supper, as she used the last of her bread to soak up what broth remained in her bowl, she decided to simply ask. “What is she like?”

“The princess?” Ben did not looked surprised by the question, exactly, but the room was just shadowy enough to hide the finer points of his expression. He spread a bit of goat cheese over his bread in a careful, deliberate manner. “Not kind.”

“You can call her Raisa,” Rey replied, throat tight. “That is her name.”

“I associate that name with pleasant memories and happy hopes, so I would prefer not to.” She could see enough of the set of his jaw to realize he was speaking truthfully. “I understand why you do not wish to claim that name, however.”

Rey blinked, sitting back in her chair. “Ah.”

“To answer your question-”

Ben paused, drumming the fingers of one hand absently on the table. “I have seen her be cruel, in thought and in action. Every moment I spent in her company was like watching a jessed, half-broken falcon seethe at an unreachable sky.”

“Poetic,” Rey murmured bitterly, hating that she understood the imagery on a deep, emotional level. 

“I believe she is very unhappy, and whether that is because she dislikes me, being under her grandfather’s thumb, or her years mewed up within convent walls I am unsure. Perhaps a blend of all three.” He paused again, then admitted, “The day I left, I woke up determined to be gentle and understanding with her- you- for as long as it took. One chat with the Emperor later I was planning an escape.” Ben gave her a self-deprecating smile. “For that alone she has good reason to hate me. It is bad form to disappear in the middle of the night.”

He, too, sat back in his chair, crossing his arms loosely over his chest. “I imagine,” he said quietly when she made no attempt at carrying on conversation, “that it must be very difficult to go from closed quarters to so much space.”

Her, her other. How dare he make her feel even a smidgen of fellow feeling for the woman who had stolen her life. “Perhaps.”

“And lonely.”

Rey had the sense that if she allowed him to speak for long enough he would start talking of impossible plans for the future, and so she cut him off at the pass. “I want to make matters clear, my lord.”

“Ben, and please do.”

“There will be no returning to the capital, no attempts at reconciliation, no calling me the true princess and raising an insurrection. I,” she said firmly, wrapping her hand tightly around the handle of the bread knife for impact, “will cut the throat of anyone who tries to put a crown on my head.”

He did not look at all cowed by the threat, nor by the weapon she held in her hand. “What if, instead, I took you to Chandrila as my honored wife and we settled in my childhood home? The duchy is mine by right, and has been well looked after by an excellent steward.” He smiled softly, encouragingly, as if what he proposed were at all possible. “No crowns, no court. We could even bring the chickens and the goat.”

“And within a year Exegol’s army would be at our doorstep, and your brother’s, too,” she snapped back, almost outraged by how much she _yearned_ for the kind of universe where she could let him carry her away. “Your letters made it clear that you had romantic tendencies, but I didn’t realize they were in place of common sense.”

Ben’s eyes never left hers, though what she could see of his expression turned grave. “So you’ll stay here, with no neighbors, no friends, and a stolen goat?” He shrugged a little at her flicker of surprise. “The nanny has the palace brand.”

“I was owed a dowry.”

“I hope that the lad who had charge of that goat was not whipped too hard for losing one of the flock.”

She froze, knuckles whitening. “If you expect me to collapse in fits of tears-”

He shook his head, reaching out to cover her hand with his own. The blade of the knife was flat under his outstretched arm, but one twist of her wrist and she stood a good chance of hitting an artery. “My intention was not to shame. I fled a betrothal between two uneasy kingdoms in the dead of night, Rey; I’m hardly in a position to scold.”

“But?”

“But you need more than what this holding can provide. No nearby markets, no easy fishing; rabbits and some fowl but little other game. I’m not surprised you had to resort to pilfering just to keep yourself fed.”

He was right, to a certain extent- it would take more hands than just her own and Ben’s to wrest anything more than a meager living from her land- but he was thinking far more kindly than she deserved. “The goat,” she said crisply. “The chickens, the flour, the preserves and salt and smoked ham I stole at midwinter, the oats and hay. I knew what would happen.”

And she had been too angry, too hurt to allow pangs of conscience to interfere with her thievery. She had eaten that ham with a kind of savage glee, and had licked her fingertips clean without a qualm. 

“They made a good choice, I suppose.” She carefully released the knife, pulling her hand free from his. “Two women with a cruel streak- or maybe they forced that trait into us both. It doesn’t matter.”

“Rey-”

“If you can’t abide sharing a roof with me, take your blankets to the stable. The goat, at least, is pure of heart.” 

Osmer slept beside her (and Ben, as best she could tell, never left), though he did so with an air of intense disapproval.

\- - -

_Poe used to delight in telling me that the witch of the royal woods would one day come for my heart (she had a fondness for lanky, quiet boys, or so Poe swore). I believe if anyone ever tried to steal me away- then or now- Poe would be the first to leap onto his horse and gallop into the woods, sword raised high with a defiant shout._

\- - -

A week passed. Ben hauled wood, built fences, did numerous chores without being asked and without complaint. He also brought her wildflowers, made her tea, and found wild catnip that rendered her cat as crazed as a kitten. When she fed him ham stolen from the palace stores (a defiant act that very nearly rendered her miserable), he offered only grave thanks and ate every scrap on his plate. 

It did not settle easily on her stomach. She found herself slipping slivers to Osmer every time Ben looked away, biting the inside of her cheek until she tasted blood. 

“What color is your hair?” he asked one morning as she tended to her garden, lingering just beyond the rows. “Dark, judging by your eyebrows.”

“Why do you care?” she asked in a grumble, yanking up weeds. It was a warm day, and the wool wrapped around her head itched. 

“Curious.” There was no irritation or menace in his voice, just calm interest. She wondered, sometimes, if she could ever provoke him into shouting, and if she would be afraid of him if he did. “It was not the fashion in Exegol for a woman to cover her hair.” A thread of protective anger slipped in. “Did they shear it off, before they sent you away?”

“They might have tried, if it had entered their minds.” She pulled up a stubborn weed with a grunt. “I wish they had. Long hair makes for an easy grip.”

And it hurt, to be on the receiving end of that kind of treatment. One moment she had been riding for her life under the cover of dark, the next her guards had pulled her down from her horse, Osmer jumping from her hold, and-

She was still somewhat surprised that the man she had called Grandfather had bothered to show up at all. It would have been easier to allow the guards to dispose of her in the woods, buried in some shallow grave, while he swilled wine in the palace. 

_No questions,_ she thought with a scowl, nearly grabbing a pea shoot by mistake. _Doubt would have plagued him for the rest of his life._

“Do you really think I would grab your hair?” 

Ben sounded offended by the notion, and Rey ( _seething at an unreachable sky; why must I understand that feeling so deeply_ ) came to her feet between peas and cabbages, hands almost shaking with frustration. “He’s ill, isn’t he?” she asked in a hard voice. “The Emperor. Wasting away, all crabbed and aged.”

He considered her for a long moment before answering. “Yes.”

“ _Good._ ” Yanking the shawl free she allowed it to drop to the dirt, her tangled hair falling down her back. “Attempt to murder me and I’ll do the same to you.”

Most men would have run, or spat curses in her direction, or reached for the nearest weapon. Ben, though, carefully navigated the rows to stand in front of her, feet not even brushing against a single good plant. She held her breath, uncertain as to what he intended- and when he reached out to lightly stroke one of the two small, imperfectly spiraling horns on the top of her head she nearly choked at the sensation. “These must be new,” he murmured. “Am I right, sweetheart?”

He traced one fingertip down the velvet-soft surface, that single touch somehow sparking heat between her legs and stiffening her nipples. “They’re very pretty, Rey.” His other hand took her chin gently, nudging her gaze up to his. “Was there always that much gold in your eyes? I’ve been wondering.”

Her eyes had been hazel, once, her crown smooth and perfectly normal. “They hurt me,” she whispered, feeling almost as if they shared the privacy of a confessional. “And I hurt them.”

The lash of a whip had cut the back of her gown into ribbons, in that torch-lit grove. Her only bit of relief had been the sight of Osmer disappearing into the trees at a streaking run. None of the guards had bothered going after him, not with better prey at hand, and she had been too scared and heart-sore to think on anything else.

“Sparrows die everyday,” the Emperor had said before giving the archer beside him a commanding gesture. Had it not been for a sudden gust of wind, that bolt would have buried itself in her heart- but it had gone astray, and pain had turned to fury which had turned to an electrifying jolt that briefly whited out her vision and raised a chorus of screams. 

She had lost time, after that. She had been leagues away before she came back to herself, body knitted together but her dress torn and crusted with blood, Osmer meowing anxiously at her side. 

“Well,” Ben said, as if she had done nothing worse than admitting a fondness for eating two helpings of dessert after dinner, “you don’t need to hide yourself from me.”

And he kissed her on the forehead, lips warm and beard tickling her skin.


	5. wild roses, clambering

_I am “pretty enough,” as Lady Primt likes to say. I am unsure if she says so in an attempt to control my vanity, or if I really am merely acceptable._

\- - -

Ben had never before seen a fellow human with horns, nor had he ever longed for the magical brides of the fairy tales his nurse had once told him, but faced with Rey’s angry revelation he had felt the oddest urge to kiss each blunt tip. She’d likely tear him to shreds for daring, but- as he sat facing her at the end of the day, the firelight reflecting unnaturally in her eyes- he couldn’t quite push away the urge. She looked tired. Still skittish, as if expecting him to pull a dagger from behind his back, but that emotion was reserved for her face alone; her body sat limp across from him. 

“Of course he tried to kill me,” she was saying wearily, finally speaking on the topic after her sprint away from him that afternoon (his lips still fresh from her skin, her eyes wild). “He’ll try to kill me again, eventually. I’m a loose end, a tool with a limited purpose. He could hardly give me a sack of gold and let me leave.”

“I beg to differ,” Ben replied in a voice he barely recognized as his own, all affront and cold rage. The corners of her mouth tipped up. 

“I read the story. About the first decoy princess.” She looked like a woman who dearly, dearly wanted the numbing escape of wine or ale. “None of the histories know her name, you know. Her real name.” Rey glared at the crumbs on her plate, then began to mush them one by one onto the pad of her index finger. “I wonder what mine was. I wonder how much I cost.”

There was no good answer, to that. Perhaps her parents had parted with her for a handful of coin (out of fear, or greed), or perhaps they had refused only to die by the side of the road. Neither scenario was comforting. “You are worth far more than mere gold.”

Her gaze flicked to his, then away as she sucked her collection of crumbs into her mouth. “I am a monster,” she said flatly. “I killed at least half the guards that tried to kill me, and even now the Emperor of this land lives in torment while I eat his food and cause trouble for his servants.” Her eyes flashed, golden and feral, and he was developing a definite penchant for the sight. “I hope he dies gasping and in terror, his bowels in knots.”

Perhaps she had been gentle, once. She still was, in some respects- with Osmer, with her animals, with the way she danced around him like a cautious fawn- but whatever openhanded warmth had existed in her was at least temporarily shoved away in favor of wary observance. And-

“I’d set you up to watch just that, if it were in my power,” he murmured truthfully, a lump in his throat. Years of managing his own issues with anger (why had his parents been on that ship, why had he been left alone so young, why had his adoptive parents sold him for security), of allowing himself to love those who had taken him in, all dispelled for a brief, heady moment. He would conquer a kingdom, for her. Tie Palpatine to his bed, watch him writhe and sob his last moments, press scented handkerchiefs under Rey’s nose to spare her the smell. Carry her away to a spot better and sweeter, with plenty of food and a soft bed and flowers to wreathe her hair. 

_I love her,_ he realized, the aftertaste of rosemary still on his tongue. He didn’t just esteem her, or think fondly of her as a friend- he loved her, this complex woman who occasionally eyed him as if he were a feast on the other side of a thick glass window. 

“Would you?” Rey asked wistfully, tilting her head slightly to the side, some of her tangled hair swinging free. Her locks nearly reached the small of her back and were in dire need of care, but he suspected the lack had a great deal to do with those velvet-soft horns on her head. 

“I would.” He moved from his chair to the floor, creeping on his knees to her side lest he overwhelm her. Fingering a waving lock, he offered, “Would you let me brush and braid your hair, love?”

Her eyes were small suns, from his position, but her hands trembled on her lap. “Why?”

“I told you in a letter, I think.” His mother and grandmother had taught him the braids, when he had been young- not all, but the most important ones. He had practiced them on every pony and horse under his care since. “Did you think I would run because you’ve had a few unorthodox alterations?” he asked in the most gently teasing tone he could manage, which he was pleased to find was (from his perspective) very gentle indeed. Rey, at least, did not flinch away. “If my mother could see you, she would be thinking up any number of ways to decorate those pretty horns with a few artful braids.”

“I’m-”

Rey looked rather confused, at that, as if his words were so far from her understanding as to be in a different language entirely. “Pretty,” she muttered, head turning away from the fire, her eyes shifting to something closer to a normal color. “Pretty?”

“Very pretty.” He lifted a hand, running a fingertip down one horn just as he had earlier that day, and again she reacted as if the act were somehow pleasurable. “Can you feel that, sweetheart?”

“Yes.” Her answer was faint, almost nonexistent, and she licked her bottom lip nervously. “It’s… nice.” She took in a trembling breath, then said, “You still want to sleep under the same roof?”

“I would sleep in the same bed, if you let me,” he answered honestly, letting his fantasy of sleeping with her head tucked under his chin slip away unspoken. “What I told you my first day still stands, Rey.”

One corner of her mouth quirked up briefly. “Not just tired of sleeping on a hard floor?” 

When he daringly rested his head on her lap, cheek pressed to worn linen, with a quiet “I have been waiting for you for a long time,” she hesitated before touching one hand lightly to his hair. 

He still slept in front of the hearth, but there had been a kind of glimmer of hope to her expression, before she had closed her bedroom door- as if she were considering that maybe, perhaps, he might be telling the truth and had every intention of staying. 

\- - -

_I’m not sure they actually intended to give me the book on herbalism. Sometimes I wonder if the volume slipped in on accident, the searcher grabbing it instead of some compendium of flower language. As such, I know how to ease a headache and cough, and how to make a burn salve, but any gentleman could hand me a posy promising death and ruin and I would accept it with a blithe smile._

\- - -

The next day, after tending to the chores and mending a rip in his breeches, Ben gathered up one of his blankets and his own brush before taking a wide-eyed Rey by the hand. “It’s a lovely day outside,” he said as he drew her out the door, Osmer following lazily. Rey’s hand in his was calloused and strong. “When was the last time you simply enjoyed the fresh air?”

“When I was five, or thereabout,” she answered coolly, a tinge of nerves in her voice. “What is this?”

“An hour of rest and peace.” Releasing her, he spread the blanket on a relatively lush patch of grass. “I’m going to brush your hair, if you’ll let me.”

She sat with a huff, hands clenched in her skirts. “I’m beginning to think all that reading destroyed your vision, my lord.”

There was no mirror in the cottage. Rey had likely only seen her own reflection in still pools of water, and by feeling out the changes with her own hands, and he suspected she avoided doing both. “I can see you perfectly well.” The freckles on her nose, the sweep of her lashes, the hints of red in the velvety nap of her horns- all beautiful. He patted the space in front of him. “Come. I’ll stop the moment you say.”

She didn’t argue, surprisingly. Instead she moved to where he indicated, her back set straight and stiff against him. When he began patiently detangling her hair she flinched, making a soft noise in the back of her throat, but at his questioning “Rey?” she just shook her head in a bid to continue. 

Bit by bit, lock by lock, he transformed tangled to smooth, working carefully around her horns and draping each completed section over her shoulder. A light breeze scented with salt swept by, teasing individual strands from his hands, and Osmer sprawled over one corner of the blanket with his belly toward the sun. When Ben finished his work he came to his knees, running his fingers through her hair. “May I try a few braids, sweetheart?” he murmured into her ear, and was rewarded with a quiet “Yes.”

He did not call to mind the betrothal braids (he would have her explicit permission, first, before plaiting those patterns into her hair), nor the braids that might be worn by any unmarried young woman. Instead, he began one of the most obscure patterns he knew, and one that had once been a favorite with his grandmother: _wild roses, clambering._

“Some,” she had said long ago, when he had been a boy of but six, “consider the pattern a warning, but they see only the thorns. I see it as a statement of resilience and determination. Wild roses, given a chance, will climb toward the sun, and if anyone tries to tear them down they will put up a fight.” She had smiled down at him, one intricate silver braid falling over her shoulder. “Your grandfather always used this pattern when I had a difficult day ahead. He knew, better than most, what it was to reach toward the sun.”

“There,” Ben said when he was done, leaning around Rey to press a kiss against her temple. “Beautiful.”

With her back still to him, she examined the thick braid that fell nearly to her waist, tied off at the end with a leather strip. Fingers tracing over the strands, she was quiet for a long, long moment. “You are a puzzle.”

“Hardly.” Lying down on his back he curved one arm loosely over his head, just enough to shade his eyes from the sun but still watch her. “I’m finally in the company of the woman I have longed to meet. I’ve been thinking on braiding your hair for two years, at least. This is the realization of a dream.”

“Ben,” she said tartly, “I killed a man by shooting lightning out of my fingers. A few, actually, though I didn’t stop to count. I’m no longer some maiden worthy of courtship.” 

“You-”

“I’m not sure I ever was,” she murmured to herself, as if he had never started to speak at all. “I think there was something inside of me the whole time, and it finally just… woke up. And now it’s coiled inside of me, waiting for another chance to strike.”

He sat up, leaning on one hand as he almost wrapped himself around her. “I have never,” he said quietly, “not once, known an animal to love a truly dangerous person.” Tilting his head toward a snoozing Osmer, he continued. “That king of cats followed you here, even after what happened in the woods. He sleeps at your feet, he begs for your affection, he curls up on your lap at the end of a long day. Hestes likes you, the chickens pay you no mind, the goat allows you to milk her without a fight.” She stared at him unblinking, a sheen of tears in her eyes. “I know your transformation was terrifying, but you, love, are no monster.”

“You have a happy nature, my lord,” she whispered faintly. 

“I cried for days when my parents died. I screamed at the sky. I fought being removed from my childhood home by tooth and nail, up to and including accidentally giving my sovereign, who came personally to escort me to the castle, a black eye.” Ben grinned crookedly at the memory. “It was months before I apologized. They were kind when I was very, very angry, and I don’t know what I would have done if they had simply sent a regent to the duchy.” 

Color flushed her cheeks. “I remember you writing about that.”

“If-”

Ben dragged in a breath, watching her face. “We are friends, Rey. Even if you don’t want to be my wife you are still my friend, and I won’t leave you alone.”

A furrow formed between her brows. “Even if,” she began slowly, “I agreed to go with you to Chandrila- even if war weren’t a possibility- what do you think would happen, Ben, when you turned up with a bride most would call a devil? Would the people who consider your duchy home be comfortable, having a mistress such as me? If we had children, who would befriend and marry them, even if they emerged looking perfectly normal?”

Wise words, but he almost felt beyond such wisdom. “We’ll never know unless we try.” 

She leaned in, brushing her mouth against his in a tentative ghost of a kiss. “They’d burn me,” she murmured, coming to her feet and startling Osmer from sleep. “And our children, too.”

“Rey.”

She stopped, looking back at him. 

“I would stand against an entire army for you and ours, and cut out their hearts one by one.”

The steel in his voice very clearly made her breath come quicker, and he did not think it was from fear. “That would certainly be a sight to see,” was her eventual reply, and she walked away, braid swinging.

\- - -

_One day I would like to see your Alderaan. You write of it so lovingly that I feel as if I could walk through the doors and know that I was home._

\- - -

He came in from the rain one gloomy day to find her bent over a bowl of water, body unnaturally still. On the table beside her Osmer sat with all the dignity and watchfulness of a stone lion at a gate, the pose tempered only by the tiny twitching of the very end of his tail. A tear dripped down Rey’s cheek, seemingly unnoticed- and then that same tear struck the surface of the water, and she abruptly sat back with a ragged gasp. 

“Rey?”

She jerked around hard enough to injure herself, hands still flat on the table. “What do you want?”

Moving slowly toward her, he raised a brow. “A chance to get dry, love, and perhaps drink some tea.”

“Ah.” Rey scrubbed at her cheeks with the back of one hand, nodding a little. “Of course.”

“What did you see?” 

When she just stared stricken at him, he nodded at the bowl of water. “Scrying? Kenobi recounted the ritual in the account of his travels in the Hapes Isles.”

A very small smile curved her lips. “What a gossip.”

“But an entertaining one.” He put on water to boil, casting a glance over the jars of tisanes on a nearby shelf. “You’ve read him.”

“Much more interesting than most historical tomes.” She stood with a sigh, taking the bowl in hand. “Might as well add this.”

Again- gently- he asked, “What did you see?”

Rey didn’t answer immediately but did pour the water into the pot, standing so close her skirts brushed against his legs. “There are soldiers at the border of Nal Hutta,” she said in an odd, toneless voice. “And my- and Raisa was crying.”

Odd, to think of Raisa crying. So odd that he almost missed the lines of strain around Rey’s mouth and the way her hands clenched. “What else?”

“Bad enough, don’t you think?” Spoken lightly, and almost at odds with her previous words. “Get the one at the end, please. I like the bits of lemon peel.” Laughing bitterly, she added in a mutter, “How many stripes for missing lemons?”

“Rey.” She kept her head bowed when he placed his hand at her back, but did lean a little into him. “I’ll give you lemons a plenty if you come with me, sweetheart.”

“Lemons.” She sounded wistful. “Lemons, and sugar, and a soft bed to rock babies in.”

He could remember, vaguely, the massive ducal bed his parents had once shared, draped in velvet hangings and on a dais. It was easy to see Rey there, an infant in her arms and her hair braided in _contentment, well-deserved,_ or _victory unashamed,_ or _beloved by her smitten lord._

“I wish,” she said faintly, “I could take you to bed and then let you go to someone better.”

“Sweetheart.” Tilting her chin up, he pressed a kiss to a corner of her mouth. “You are not replaceable.”

She didn’t believe him, that much was clear, but looked as if she wished to. “I never should have stolen you away.”

And he understood that- kingdoms were doubtless in uproar, beyond their small little holding; his guilt building and building- but he also wouldn’t have done anything differently. Leaving her alone with just chickens and goat and cat (and what would she do, when Osmer left her?) was a thought that hurt to his very bones. “Four years of letters.” Ben pulled her into his arms, nuzzling at her hairline with due respect for her horns. “That is a long time, sweetheart.”

“Yes.” He could almost feel, through her dress, sparks leaping from her skin to his. “You are very good, Ben.”

Days passed, and her demeanor shifted from thorny to _quiet._ She ate quietly, she weeded quietly, she stared into the fire quietly. She sobbed (he thought, the sound faint) quietly after the bedroom door was shut between them. 

And one day he entered the stable and found her whispering to Hestes quietly, the horse still and grave under her hands. “What a good boy,” she said when she spotted Ben, fingering a braid he had worked into Hestes’ mane ( _betrothed in love_ ; practice). “You trained him well, my lord.”

She was slipping away, and every soft gesture and word he offered only made her smile a little more distant.


	6. lullay, lullay

_I had terrible nightmares as a child, particularly after my parents died. They slowly faded away, as I grew older- a happy resolution for both myself and you, who should not have to deal with a husband thrashing and weeping in his sleep._

\- - -

She fought the inevitable, at first. Told herself that the fleeting images and contextless scenes in the bowl were tainted by her own fear, that she was seeing danger where there was none. She could still have her year and a day, could still greedily squirrel away memories of Ben’s presence before sending him back to his family. She could end her life as an old crone on the moor, thinking wistfully of the man who had once braided her hair and who had sat beside her in front of the fire every night smelling of stolen lavender soap. She could push away the conflicted pangs of conscience she felt, filching supplies, once it was only her and Osmer and the livestock. She could learn to fish, to set rabbit snares, to keep fertilized eggs warm and raise chicks. 

The images, though, only grew clearer, and worse: her other scrutinizing maps, a furrow marring her perfect brow and the familiar form of Lady Primt hovering behind her. A brief glimpse of the people Rey guessed were Ben’s family, huddled around a table in furious debate. Mounted soldiers, bearing the banners of Exegol through the rocky mountain passes that led from the capital to the east. 

Other images came and went, but the soldiers stayed. Day by day the terrain changed, as they drew closer, and day by day Rey clenched her teeth against the knowledge that her precious time was narrowing to a very small window. She pulled herself inward, little by little, and on the day she saw their horses reach the outer edges of the moor she gave up what little hope she had left. This was no quest for some far harbor, no strike against a rebellious baron. The moor held only Rey, and everything Rey had stolen. 

Two days, she determined after careful thought, hands shaking. She had studied the maps and the speed of a traveling calvary regiment during her tutelage; the math was easy enough. 

_Two days._

Not a great deal of time, for all that she had begrudgingly considered every course of action she might take at just such a moment. Not a great deal of time, even when only one plan suited the circumstances. 

She cried that night in her bed, and worked herself weary the next, and it was only when the light began to fade that she allowed herself to simply be. One night left when she had once expected to have a year and a day. One night left, with a storm burgeoning outside and the barest pinch of stolen salt to enhance their rabbit stew. 

“Won’t have to steal again,” she murmured to herself as she stirred, Osmer washing himself nearby. “That’s something, at least.”

The door creaked behind her, the scent of rain and the low rumbling of thunder sweeping in at Ben’s back. “A storm is coming in.”

“I know.”

“It looks like a bad one.” She heard him kneel behind her, felt the warmth and strength of his hands curl over her shoulders. “Can we do anything for the garden?”

The rain could pound the plants into the dirt or sweep them away entirely; it hardly mattered. “You don’t need to worry about that.”

“Magic?” he asked, breath hot against her ear. She licked her bottom lip, glad he couldn’t see her expression. “The animals are bedded down, so we won’t need to go outside, at least. Just a-”

Ben hesitated for a brief, brief moment, hands sliding to her upper arms. “A cozy night,” he finished quietly. “Would you like me to read to you, sweetheart? I did bring a few books.”

She would like to have a taste of everything that had once been promised her, but there were boundaries even Rey wouldn’t cross. When she didn’t shrug his hands away he leaned in, pressing a kiss just below one ear. Swallowing a gasp, Rey quivered. “Unfair.”

She more felt than heard his huffed laugh. “The books or the kiss?” 

“Both.”

“You can _have_ both, love.” 

It would be fairer to freeze him out for one more night. Fairer, but she _wanted-_ wanted warmth, and love, and the chance to curl up in his arms and briefly push aside fear and guilt. All those years of letters, of hopes… surely one happy night was yet another thing she could steal, provided she kept her thievery modest. 

He stroked her rumpled hair with a hand she knew, instinctively, would never use the length as a leash, hair she hadn’t allowed him to braid in days. The words _take me away_ burned in her chest, nearly seizing her tongue. They could run from what she saw coming: ride Hestes further east, and board a ship or follow the coastline into Chandrila. They might earn a few months, maybe even a year if she adopted an old-fashioned wimple and never showed her hair outside of their bedchamber. She would consider doing just that, if her life were the only one forfeit for such a maneuver. 

But it wasn’t, and her path was set. She willed herself to relax. “Would you braid my hair again?”

There was a hitch in his breath, and then he was pressing a light kiss to the nape of her neck. “I would love to.”

Drawing her knees up to her chest, she let out a quiet sigh as he began combing his fingers through her hair. “You once wrote,” Rey whispered, “that you like to sing.” That he had sung, with his grandmother and mother, and that- in his first year an orphan, when everything had been new and strange- Queen Horatia had learned several Alderaanian songs to soothe him to sleep. Rey almost wished she could meet the woman for that kindness alone. 

“You’d like a song?” He didn’t sound perturbed by the idea, but shyly pleased. 

“No one has sung to me since- since my nurse left.” And it wasn’t as if she had been given a chance to attend court entertainments or stumble across village fiddlers or shepherds with flutes. “I miss music, or what I knew of it.” Biting her lower lip briefly, nearly hard enough to draw blood, she dared ask, “What are instruments like?”

His hands stilled. “Beautiful,” he finally murmured after a long moment, sounding choked. “I’ll make sure you hear every one, Rey.”

_No, you won’t._ “Thank you.”

Ben resumed his work, and after a moment began to sing in a low, soft voice of lovers meeting in a gingerbell field, pledging their troth in defiance of feuding parents. 

And then a naughty ballad more suited to a tavern, amusement edging his voice as he tied off her braid. 

And then a common lullaby as he pulled her back onto his lap, arms wrapped around her middle. She rested her cheek against his chest, letting her eyes close as he crooned the words her nurse had sung so many years ago before leaving her forever: _lullay, lullay, the sun shines for thee._

When he was done she tipped his chin down and kissed him, his lips warm and clinging to hers, their tongues barely touching. A small, perfect moment, and one that would have to suffice in lieu of what should have been a lifetime of moments.

She fed him stew and tea before retreating to her lonely bed, ignoring the new hope in his eyes. 

\- - -

_I was sick, the day my parents died, else I would have been on that ship with them. I begged my mother to let me go, but she rested her cool hand against my fevered skin and tucked me back into bed, promising to tell me a story after they returned. I refused to let anyone read me a story for months, after that; I was waiting on a tale from my mother and no one else would do._

_I do sometimes wonder what tale she had in mind, if any, but knowing my mother the princess would have saved the prince with cleverness and a dagger, and he would have loved her for it._

\- - -

Rey donned her nicest dress (only one patch, and in a faded green) on waking. She cooked fresh bread with the last of the flour, and murmured words over Ben’s morning tea as she added a generous drizzle of honey just the way he liked it. She spent several minutes cuddling and whispering to Osmer, scritching under his chin and around his ears, and gave him a little dish of rabbit as a treat. 

“Would you take me for a ride?” she asked Ben after he finished seeing to the goats and chickens, and with a smile on his face he caught her in a kiss that nearly made her resolve crumble before leaving to saddle Hestes.

She packed his belongings one by one, adding in grain and bread, preserved meat and dried fruit. He would do well enough until he reached the border, and she had picked the shortest, safest route- and after that, he would be in Chandrila, and the odds of him starving there were low. Tea and bandages, salves and balms. He would be fine.

Rey carried the supplies out with her, Osmer at her heels, meeting him on the worn path between the stable and the cottage. “Are we leaving?” he asked, giving her and the wisps of smoke emerging from the chimney a questioning frown. “Should I- should I turn the chickens and goat loose? We could lead the goat, at least.”

“No.” She had the spell ready; all it took was her bare hand against his cheek and he was hers. “You are, Ben.”

His expression shifted to confusion, and then- as his body moved automatically toward Hestes- to a pleading, desperate horror. “Rey.” He mounted smoothly, his hands finding the reins. “ _Please._ ”

“Don’t worry, I’m not sending you back to the Emperor.” It took her a few tries to secure the saddlebags and rolled blankets (a lack of practice, she told herself, and certainly not her trembling fingers or the way she had to blink back tears, throat tight), but she finally managed the job, eyes cast down. “You’ll be home soon, and I think the weather will be clear for a few days. No rain, just nice- nice breezes.”

“ _Why?_ ”

The word sounded as if it had been torn from his chest, and she paused for a moment, fingertips barely touching his knee. “I’ve been very selfish,” was her eventual answer, true and yet skirting the truth. “I-”

“I pressured you,” he interrupted in a low, urgent voice. “We don’t have to leave here, if you want to stay. I could go to the nearest village for supplies a few times a year; bring back more chickens, another goat, a wagon.”

“No.” She shook her head hard, wisps of loose hair settling around her face. “No. Go claim your Alderaan. Defend your borders, and tell your family in no uncertain terms that they aren’t allowed to trade you for security again. Take a bride and tell your children stories.” Rey did risk looking up, at that, forcing a strained smile. “Sing them songs.”

He obviously wanted to grab her under the arms and pull her up, but her hold was too strong. He would have autonomy, once he was away, but the spell wouldn’t allow him to turn back. “And Osmer, of course,” she continued, bending to pick up her precious cat and feeling as if her heart were breaking. “He must have a feather pillow to sleep on, and plenty of fish, and a pretty cat to keep company with.”

It was harder than she had imagined, to settle a bespelled Osmer on Ben’s lap, to clench her hands in her skirts lest she steal one last touch. “He’s been my only friend for a very long time.” One tear slid past her guard, slipping down her cheek. “And you, but- but warm fur is a little different from letters, isn’t it?”

And he had kept her somewhat whole, in that tower, and somewhat level in the cottage. Somewhat human.

Ben’s face had paled, his expression shifting grave and shadowed. “What did you see?” he asked in a whisper. “You have a reason.”

“Soldiers.” And the Emperor, slamming a wrinkled fist on a table with fury and a flinch of pain. “Moving east.” 

“Come with me, then, or let me stay.” Every line of his body read as frantic, but he sat still as stone. “You don’t have to face them alone.”

“Ben.” She gave in to temptation and touched him, wrapping her hand around the back of one muscled calf. “I was born to be alone, I think.” Hard words that dropped easily from her tongue, because they felt like truth. “You and Osmer were a reprieve, and-”

Rey hesitated, and what she had left to say came out thick and blurred with still-unshed tears. “And now you both go.”

They would be better for it. Ben’s family would find a way to keep him safe, and Ben would keep Osmer safe, and whatever happened between her and the coming soldiers would give the moor a dark reputation for years to come. Maybe there would be song, one day, and Ben would cover his children’s ears whenever he heard the first notes. Maybe he would tell them about the witch who stole him away, for a time, before his triumphant return home. The tale needn’t be complimentary, and likely his wife would prefer if it weren’t- no mentions of braids or kisses or wildflowers, just a sharpening of her cheekbones and teeth and a reddening of her eyes. Skulls at the gate, and chickens with a taste for blood. 

Maybe Osmer’s kittens would sleep at the ends of their beds, well-groomed and well-fed. 

She leaned in for just a moment, pressing her forehead against his knee. “Take my hand,” she heard him say, and she didn’t have to look up again to know he was crying. “Come with me. Today, now.”

“No.” Rey stepped back, hand dropping away. With a crooked smile she asked, “What was that dreadful play your tutor made you read, years ago? The one where the hero made that overly dramatic speech about letting the past die?” 

His eyes were dark, his expression despairing. “ _The Red Chamber._ ”

“‘And if needs must, I will put even the past to the sword’,” she quoted softly. The line had made her laugh, once. “Let Exegol try to kill their past a second time. They won’t be satisfied until they do.” 

She was clearly breaking him to pieces with every word, and added that guilt to the burden already at her back. “You can’t stand against an entire army, sweetheart,” he said coaxingly.

“No, but they’ll take losses, and they won’t have you.”

“Rey-”

“Go.”

And Hestes- who had taken her whispered words the day before, and was as bound by them as his riders- sprang forward, carrying her heart away with him. 

\- - -

_As of today, Finn’s betrothal is official. He is smitten with his future bride, and blushes when we tease him about it in private. Rose will be a good match for him, and a good queen- she has heart and intelligence, and the courage of a lioness. The date is not yet set, but if it does come before our marriage I hope that your grandfather might allow you to attend. I would like to celebrate their happiness at your side, and dance with you at the feast after._

\- - - 

It was a beautiful day. She barely noticed, but it was a beautiful day as she worked with mechanical purpose through the needed tasks. She gathered the chickens and goat, and with the last of the salt made her circle and sent them back from whence they came. A search of the coop revealed two eggs, and close inspection of the storm-trampled plants in the garden added a few carrots and a handful of peas in their shells. That, and the heel of the bread, was her last meal.

It all tasted, when she prepared it, like ash. 

She banked the fire and made the bed, washed the dishes and emptied the chamber pot. What little was hers was tidied away into cupboards, there for any brave soul who might one day dare to enter. 

When there was nothing left to do she settled outside the door, running her fingers over the messy remains of her braid ( _wild roses, clambering,_ Ben had said), and waited for the inevitable.


	7. boundaries

_My parents, Nurse used to tell me, were a devoted pair who preferred their country estate to the bustle of court. My mother was sweet, my father hearty; she was beautiful, he was handsome. They were happy to be having a child, and planned to raise me away from the capital._

_Nurse never knew them, of course. I do wonder, now, how much of what she told me was a tale to soothe a lonely child._

\- - -

His hands would not obey him, for all that he was desperate to drag the reins to the right and wheel his mount around. Hestes, usually sensitive to voiced orders, cantered on without ceasing even as his ears indicated that he heard every plea. Ben himself could not even make himself look back, though Rey and her holding were long past seeing. The moor ahead, blurred by tears, stretched on endlessly. 

And Osmer- poor Osmer, who made no attempt to flee but did have his claws hooked in Ben’s clothing- wailed like a child denied his mother. “I know,” Ben choked out after a string of frantic invective. “I know.” 

The cat, trembling, pressed desperately against him, and just like that Ben _could_ move- but only one hand, and only to comfort Osmer. “Oh, Rey,” he breathed, stunned. So strong, and so kind under all that pain, and so damnably stubborn that he would braid _stone (unworn by water)_ into her hair if she were right in front of him. 

“Which I will,” he muttered, blinking and pushing down panic. Such a woman couldn’t possibly be taken down by a mere army; when he finally wrested control of himself he would return and pluck her from a battlefield, weary and prickly and in need of his care. He would take her home and snarl at anyone who dared look at her askance, he would braid loving messages into her hair and marry her in front of the entire court. He would pleasure her on soft sheets as she whimpered and her toes curled, her nails raking down his back. 

“I will.” The hopeless tinge to his words (because when would the magic fade?) made his stomach sour. There would be no other spouse for him, whatever Rey thought. It would be her and him, and if their babes had little nubby horns he would dedicate his life to ensuring their safety. 

“And your proud line, of course,” he managed, fingers curling protectively around the back of Osmer’s neck. “What a prize you’ll be with the duchy cats.”

Assuming Osmer didn’t dart away when the magic faded, a fate Ben could hardly stand. “Rey gave you into my care,” he told the cat, and if he had been able to do more than weep he would have. “You will have your feather pillows and fish and company, or Rey may very well-”

 _Haunt me,_ had been on his tongue, and he faltered. “Your mistress,” Ben said in a raspy voice, “will pay for this.”

In terms unknown to her. Not with blood or lack of food or pain, but with lazy, sleepy hours, the taste of sugared lemons in her mouth and Ben’s hands on her tense shoulders. He would see her soft and dozing and happy as proof that life could be sweet, and keep proving just that fact.

He just had to make his way back to her, first. 

“How long, do you think?” Ben muttered aloud, as if either Hestes or Osmer might answer. “Before the magic fades?” Osmer shifted, curling into a marginally less tense ball on Ben’s lap. “The border? Chandrila’s capital?”

He received his answer several hours later, when Hestes- lathered and in need of a rest, but not suffering any damage from their brisk pace- finally stopped near a stream. Cursing his relief and holding Osmer in the crook of one arm, Ben dismounted and turned in the direction they had come. He took one step, and another, and another- and then turned against his will, the move feeling oddly as if Rey herself stood at his back with her hands on his shoulders, gently but firmly guiding him toward the correct path. 

Osmer, ears pinned back, sunk his claws into Ben’s hand in a bid for attention. “If I set you down, will you run?” Ben asked, voice hoarse. “I know you have needs, but-”

But there was nothing for it. Osmer and Hestes both had to be seen to before he could even consider further testing his boundaries; he could go nowhere without them. Ben knelt, biting back a groan at the stretch of muscles locked so long in one position, and settled Osmer on the ground. The cat- blessedly- butted his head against Ben’s hand with a grouchy hiss before stalking away to desecrate a patch of grass. Osmer was not happy, that much was clear, but he looked as if he would stay- and judging by the perturbed glare he was casting toward his far-away mistress, might still be bound by magical ties of his own to keep him within Ben’s orbit. 

“And you, my valiant friend,” he murmured to Hestes as he made short work of removing the saddle. “You must demand many apples and lumps of sugar from her, when we find my lady.”

A whicker, as if in agreement. 

Ben rubbed Hestes down, giving his mount little sips of water, little bites of grain between walking him at a sedate pace. When he thought Hestes was well enough to be left to his own devices (and Osmer, after a fierce bathing session, had ascended to a low branch in a nearby tree, tail twitching), Ben turned his attention to the problem at hand. Persistence might win the day- or so he had hoped, until repeatedly walking in the same direction ended the same way, time after time.

Or surprise, but his attempt to zig and zag his way homeward merely sent him in a circle. 

Or anger, but cursing and darting forward at a run resulted in being thrown backward onto his ass (head ringing, breath knocked from his chest) as if bounced off some invisible shield. Hestes ambled over, snuffling at Ben’s face as he stared up at the sky. “She’s a menace,” Ben told his horse when he could again breathe. “I’m going to turn her over my knee.”

Hestes snorted in what sounded like doubtful amusement. 

“I am,” Ben insisted, sitting up with a wince. “I’m-”

 _I’m stuck,_ he thought with a sinking heart. _Utterly and completely._

So- with the desperate hope that more time would resolve the problem- Ben made camp in a nearby hollow, feeding both his companions and himself. At intervals he tested his leash, and was always beaten back. 

When the sun reached its zenith the next day, he begrudgingly saddled Hestes and, gathering up Osmer, continued his journey toward Chandrila. 

If he couldn’t return for her, he would send Poe, a healer, and an army in his stead- because if the magic still held, _surely_ that meant Rey yet lived. 

And when he safely arrived at the kingdom of his birth, only to realize he could move in any direction _except_ over the border, he screamed at the sky, scaring a flock of birds from the trees. 

\- - -

_I dreamed of you last night. May I say, my lord, that it is quite improper to steal a lady’s shawl and jump out the window with it; I expect an apology._

\- - -

A hush and ensuing buzz followed him all the way from the city gates to the castle entrance, and when he swung down from the saddle in the great courtyard stunned courtiers and servants alike stopped in their tracks to gape. Grimy and facial hair untrimmed, a hard frown on his face, Ben gave Hestes into the care of the first stablehand to break free from shock. With Osmer cradled in one arm he strode inside, intent on finding one or both of his brothers. 

He found, instead, a wide-eyed Rose, garbed in the red of her namesake. “ _Stars,_ ” she breathed, marching forward to snare his hand. “I knew you’d show up,” she continued briskly, the sheer oddity of her presence breaking through the single-minded purpose that had driven him for days. “Send up a bath to his rooms, please,” she instructed a nearby servant before Ben could speak, and without a _by-your-leave_ began to tow him deeper into the castle. “And food, with some chopped meat for the cat.”

“Why-”

“Your friend looks to be in much better shape than you.” Rose shot a piercing glare at him over her shoulder. “I would wager that your mount, if you arrived with one, is also in fine fettle.”

“I couldn’t take the time for myself,” he grumbled, allowing her to drag him on. “I need to see Poe.”

“Poe is in Exegol.”

Ben stopped abruptly, holding fast when Rose heaved with a grunt. “ _What?_ ”

“Must we have this conversation in a corridor?” she snapped, and he caught a sheen to her eyes that indicated her self-possession was a front for much deeper emotions. “I’d shove you into a horse trough and scrub you myself, but your mother would never forgive me for the detour no matter how badly you smell. _Come._ ”

He stumbled on, feeling oddly off-kilter. “Are you officially my sister, now?”

“Oh, yes,” she said flatly. “Excellent time for a state wedding, when the groom is unsure whether to grieve or declare all out war. I’m here because Finn needs me, and-”

Rose hesitated, then added in a mutter, “And so that if, perhaps, he needs allied troops, we can marry quickly and force Paige’s hand.” She glanced at him again, a humorless half-smile on her face. “I came of my own accord.”

She was a force to be reckoned with, his future sister. “Thank you.” Weary and wistful he added, “For loving him.”

Rose flushed, but a bit of brightness returned to her expression. “I’m lucky.” 

“You remind me of my Rey,” he murmured, fatigue creeping at his heels. Osmer felt like an impossible weight. “Will you help me, Rose?”

Something about his tone seemed to catch her attention, slowing her steps. After considering their surroundings she pulled him into an alcove. “Raisa?” she asked quietly, gaze sharp. 

“Rey.” A tear- unbidden, and when he had thought himself cried dry- slipped down his cheek. “I-”

Rose opened her mouth to answer when he faltered, hesitated herself, then guided him with more care down the hall. “Best tell all of us at the same time,” she told him. “You’re liable to fall over any moment; might even create a hole in the floor-”

“I love her, Rose.”

She looked a little stricken, at that declaration, enough that some surge of energy had him crowding her against a wall. Osmer jumped from his arms with an indignant hiss, but stayed within sight. “What do you know?” he asked desperately, watching as her spine straightened, her chin tilted upward with a courageous jut. “ _What?_ ”

“Exegol,” Rose began carefully, eyes narrowed slightly, “told us that an enchantress from Nal Hutta stole you away.”

Ben thrummed with anxious energy. What a perfect story they had concocted: a vengeful, defeated kingdom, a witch, a stolen prince. “And?” His voice came out faint, barely more than a whisper. 

“We received word from Poe just this morning.” She licked her lips in the first show of nervousness yet. “Your captor is- is dead, Ben.”

He felt- empty. Insubstantial, as if he might actually dissolve into the ether. “No.”

“Poe was there.” Her words were quiet, and unsteady. “He saw, first-hand.”

 _I’ve ridden for days,_ Ben thought numbly. _She- she should be there, breathing and grumbling and feeding the chickens-_

Poe, though- for all his winsome exterior and laughing ways- was no liar. 

“Ben?” Rose said softly, hand clenching around his. 

He heard his own voice as if from a distance. “Please tell my lady mother I will attend to her later.” Ben wrested himself free, stumbling away. “I must… bathe.”

“Ben?”

She had been so broken-hearted, his Rey. She had known what was coming, and-

He moved like a wraith toward his old rooms, gathering up a skittish Osmer and barely noticing the dig of claws into his skin. 

\- - -

_I miss you, between letters._

\- - -

“What can I do?”

She was immovable, his adoptive mother. She wouldn’t leave him alone. As he lay still on his bed, still processing Rose’s words ( _dead_ ), Horatia worked a section of his hair into one of the braids she had learned for his sake alone. _Blossoming in adversity,_ perhaps, or _gentle heart,_ her two favorites. 

“Ben?”

He pressed his face into his pillow, closing his eyes against what light slipped past the curtains. He could feel no joy, not even in being clean for the first time in days- though scrubbed raw (desperate to feel something, anything) was a more accurate description. “I was not bewitched,” he mumbled.

She hummed under her breath, tying off the braid. “I know.”

Her words and the sorrowful cast to her voice had him lifting his head. “You do?”

“After Lando’s son was sure to live, we spoke.” She glanced toward a slumbering Osmer, stuffed full of chicken and sprawled over the foot of Ben’s bed. “The infamous Osmer, I take it?” Horatia cupped his cheek when he averted his gaze. “Did you find your lady, Ben? The one who wrote you all those letters?”

Slowly, slowly, he rolled over, tangling his fingers with hers. She could have left him alone, all those years ago. She could have consigned him to the nursery, to be raised by nannies and tutors- but instead Horatia had declared him her own. He could be nothing but honest with her. “She was their decoy, like that old story,” Ben said in a quiet, raspy voice. “The Emperor tried to murder her before I arrived.”

He heard, faintly, her surprised inhale of breath. “Oh, my dear.”

“I love her.” He could not bring himself to render the verb in the past tense. “I would have stayed for her, but- but ‘they won’t have you’.” His voice broke on the words. “That’s what she said to me, before forcing me away.”

Her hand, trembling slightly, came to rest on his hair. “It is a small thing,” she whispered, “but I will light a candle for her every day for the rest of my life.”

One flickering, small flame for a woman who should have been able to blaze bright beside him until, hair white and hands wrinkled, she closed her eyes for the last time. “I won’t make a marriage for Chandrila, Mother. I won’t-”

_Can’t._

“-return to Exegol.”

“No,” his mother agreed, sounding as if she were on the verge of tears. “No, my dear, you shall not.”

She stroked his hair until he fell into a troubled, restless sleep.

\- - -

_I imagine, sometimes, sneaking away to join the midwinter festivities and dancing around the bonfires. Hardly befitting a princess, I know, but who would ever expect to see the heir to the kingdom by firelight, her skirts flaring out in an exuberant spin? I suspect I could pull off the gambit quite successfully, and the next day the only question would be “Who was that mysterious stranger, the one who laughed so loudly?”_

_I do hope they decide that I was some ghost or fae, slipping through the thinning veil between two worlds. What a story that would make._

\- - -

He was pitied, that much was clear- pitied and possibly feared, as if visible shreds of magic clung to him, threatening to ensnare anyone who came too close. Only Finn, their mother, and Rose treated him with any kind of normalcy, and he almost wished that they, too, would keep their distance. 

“You have to eat,” his mother said one day after ordering him to her solar. “I understand wanting to avoid supping at the great hall, but abstaining entirely is out of the question.”

“I am not abstaining entirely,” he replied wearily, offering Osmer a bit of cheese from the meal provided. “I do eat, I promise you.”

“Not enough.” With a sigh she shredded cold beef onto a plate before pushing it Osmer’s way. “That fine feline gentleman eats better and more often than you, my dear.”

“He has earned the right to a luxurious life.”

“Hmm.” 

She watched him, his mother. Rose appeared at his side at odd hours of the day, her ladies falling back the moment she bustled toward him. Finn, busy though he was with matters of state, coaxed him into playing games of chess and joined several of his rides through the royal woods, the questions he harbored never spoken aloud.

The possessions Ben had abandoned in Exegol’s palace returned without his brother but with a stiff, formal note from Raisa, apologizing for his suffering at the hands of a foreign agent and brushing aside a long-standing contract as if it were as frivolous as a gaming debt between friends. She would make no demands on his hand or his name, Raisa assured him, and not a word was wasted on the Emperor. 

Ben, too mired in depression to take note, tossed the vellum into the fire and stared into the flames as Osmer partook daintily of his barely touched meal. 

He chopped wood and hauled water until he realized he was making the servants uncomfortable, at which point he moved his exertions to the sparring yards. The burn of overworked muscles (hacking wooden dummies to stumps, firing arrow after arrow into targets swaying in the breeze) was preferable to the numbness- and then one day, while stringing his bow, the cord snapped and lashed a mark down his face and neck, barely missing his eyes. Amidst panicked shouts and the feel of hot blood trickling down his skin he found himself thinking, _Rey would be very upset with me._

Two weeks later, his face forever marred and his despairing, restless haze replaced by a newly grave demeanor, he bid goodbye to his worried family and left to take up his duties at Alderaan.


	8. songs unsung

_I have spent the entire morning studying battle tactics with the most dour and boring tutor imaginable, and- after a year of just such lessons- I’m afraid I informed the honorable gentleman that I would be inviting all potential adversaries to very polite tea parties rather than settling in for a long siege. Poor Sir Arthur sputtered so intensely I nearly suspected him a victim of an apoplexy._

\- - -

They came not at sunset, but in the dusk that settled after: calvary, and at least two dozen. 

_Possibly three,_ Rey thought as she squinted into the gloom. Not that it mattered. Some of them would die, but a stray arrow or blade would take her before the end. Rey knew her remaining time was counted in minutes, and even the smug, bitter satisfaction she felt over having Ben, Osmer, and the animals safely away felt thin and stretched in the face of that knowledge. 

The horde stopped at what they likely assumed to be a cautious distance. Slowly, carefully, Rey came to her feet, feeling the first hint of fire run through her veins. She could reach them from her location, no matter what they thought- she could pull down lightning from the clear, starry sky, terrifying their mounts into tossing them to the ground and fleeing. She would prefer to save the horses, if possible. She had liked Hestes. 

At movement ahead she stiffened, fingers spread, only to realize that that two figures had _dismounted_ and were striding toward her. More movement beyond as others dismounted- some readying bows, some lighting torches- but the two traversing the empty space between enemy camps moved at a fast clip, never looking back. The first to come within identifiable sight was a man, holding an unsheathed sword and clearly on the edge of violence. 

The second was her other, blonde hair pinned up and wearing dark riding leathers. “I believe,” she said in a low, steady voice, “that we should talk.”

A rough, humorless laugh ripped itself from Rey’s chest, sounding brittle and broken in the dark. “Do you?” She held her ground, flicking one wrist and setting the lantern hung behind her alight. How the man reacted was a mystery; she couldn’t move her gaze away from the sight of her other’s mouth flattening into a thin, sharp line, eyes darting upward at Rey’s horns. “I hardly expected to see you so far from home and its many comforts.”

“The Emperor is dying,” Raisa replied flatly. “Much to his annoyance, his hold over me is no longer what it once was.” 

“Congratulations.”

For whatever reason- perhaps it was the snarl in Rey’s voice- one corner of her other’s mouth tipped upward. “He suffers every day.” Not the tone of a grieving granddaughter, but a kind of mild, distant pleasure. “He still gives me trouble, but it is amazing how easily courtiers and soldiers alike can be swayed by a pretty face, particularly when the man on the throne reeks ever more like a corpse.” She dipped her head in a slight nod at Rey. “As I see it, I owe you a boon.”

This was a danger Rey had not expected, and one that made her itch. It would have been so much more preferable to simply lash out at a distance, doing as much damage as possible without ever once seeing the features of her opponents’ faces. She did not want to accept anything from the woman who had supplanted her, and who viewed Rey as a loose end to be tidied. “Do you?” 

“I-”

The man impatiently huffed and stepped forward, actually shouldering Raisa to the side. “There will be no talk of _boons_ until I see my brother,” he announced harshly. Raisa, still as stone, had a look in her eyes as if she were systematically flaying him with her mind. “And even then, the only boon I may allow would be that of a quick death.”

“You overstep, Prince,” Raisa said in cool, crisp warning as Rey considered the man, understanding and a new depth of despair coming quick. She couldn’t kill Ben’s brother. She couldn’t even _chance_ killing the man, not without tarnishing her memory in Ben’s mind, and that left her a defenseless lamb facing slaughter. “I am the one to be obeyed on this moor, not you,” Raisa continued. “And if I tell my men to restrain you, they will do so.”

“Abduction of my brother is an act of war, Princess,” Poe- for this _must_ be Poe, with his curls and dark eyes and protective anger- spat. “So I will see him, and then and only then will there be talk of whether or not her life is spared.”

Raisa speared him with a glare that would have toppled a lesser man. “Perhaps, then,” she said through gritted teeth to Rey, “you might prove the health and well-being of your captive.”

“I sent him away.” The words should have been victorious; instead they came out limned with fatigue. For a moment she thought Poe might actually charge her, and almost welcomed the fate. “He left on Hestes’ back this morning, with ample supplies and not a mark on him.”

A beat, and then Poe was shoving his way through the door, snatching up the lantern as he went and calling Ben’s name. A shout from the horde had Raisa throwing up her hand in a staying motion, calling back “ _Hold._ ”

A breeze swept past them, tugging at the loose strands of Rey’s hair. Raisa- her expression indicating that Rey was a stranger creature than she had bargained for- asked with genuine curiosity, “Why?” 

“Because you don’t deserve him, and neither do I,” Rey replied truthfully, weary of secrets. Poe held the means of her death in his hand; the fruitless search was a mere delay, and one that would likely increase his upset. Later he would care about strained relations between Exegol and Chandrila. Later he might actually feel guilt, once he returned home to find his brother hale and hearty. Later was a meaningless concept to Rey. “Demand he return to Exegol and I will haunt you mercilessly.”

“I believe that.” Raisa gave Rey a long, extended look in the gloom, her gaze sweeping upward from her feet to her ragged hem to the patch at the waist, up and up to the betraying horns. “Grandfather made you out to be some kind of demon,” she mused, “when most would take you for a dryad temporarily outside of her tree.”

It was odd, talking with her other. Raisa’s opening salvo had been easier to handle, but this new tact- soft words, quiet amusement- rendered Rey unsteady. Poe left the cottage at a quick walk, sweeping toward the stable. “Why are you here?”

Her other’s chin tilted up stubbornly. “Because waiting prettily for him to die would make me a pawn rather than a player.” A kind of grim satisfaction slipped into Raisa’s tone. “I have spent too long behind walls and locked doors. From now on _I_ hold the keys.”

Despite herself Rey felt a flare of begrudging admiration, and squashed it down immediately. “Ben disapproved of how you treated the servants.”

That actually seemed to fluster Raisa, a little. “I,” she muttered with what sounded like annoyance, “was not at my best. It was- is- hard, to deal with so many people.” She crossed her arms over her chest tightly. “The nuns who raised me believed in the virtues of solitude and quiet reflection, particularly for willful girls.”

So she could be angry _for_ Raisa. What a concept. “They locked you in, too.”

“For the slightest of missteps, and for days at a time. My room was eight steps wide and ten steps deep.” Raisa exhaled, her breath coming out in a hiss. “It smelled of damp stone, incense, and a chamber pot in need of scrubbing.” A ghost of a laugh escaped. “If the inhabitants of that convent are very lucky, I will allow them to gather their things and leave before I raze the entire complex and sow the ground with salt.”

In the distance, Poe cursed at the top of his lungs. The horde, restless, shifted a few steps before stopping to wait for an order- and at that, Raisa pulled a dagger from her belt. “Even after hearing the tales from the survivors, they still underestimate you for being a woman,” she said in a low, low voice. “We’ll have to make this look believable, do you understand? Dramatic. Everyone who leaves this place must be able to truthfully brag in a tavern that they saw the witch of the moors slain.”

With a taunting smile- for Rey no more believed Raisa would spare her than she believed the grass would grow red- she asked, “Hoping to accomplish what the Emperor failed to do?”

“A nice bonus,” Raisa admitted easily enough. “I appear to kill you, then return home to fanfare and respect. I might even be able to fake a tear when my grandfather passes beyond the veil. And _you-_ well, I hear that Chandrila is lovely, and Alderaan charming.”

Rey’s heart actually skipped an uncomfortable beat. “And when word comes of a woman with horns, don’t you think some people might make the connection?”

“No.” Raisa smirked. “Not when every song, every tale speaks of the hideous, twisted witch of the moors- and not when the songs from Chandrila are of Prince Ben and his beautiful fairy bride, who rescued him from a terrible fate. Yon stomping, cursing lout wouldn’t dare breathe a word, provided his brother were happy.”

“And?” Rey persisted, every muscle in her body tense. “What else? Tribute? A magical assassin at your beck and call?”

Raisa’s answer was curt. “Stay out of my kingdom.” In a mocking tone she added, “And I will stay out of yours, _sister._ ” 

Light from Poe’s lantern appeared, the horde milled and muttered. And Rey- who had prepared herself for death, who had sent away everyone she held dear, who had never known anyone save Nurse and Ben to make an offer that did not involve pain- made a split-second decision and smiled humorlessly. “Aim for the shoulder,” she said, and pulled a bolt of lightning from the sky to strike the roof of her cottage, the first flash highlighting the moment when Raisa’s dagger plunged downward. 

Pain, sharp and breathtaking, lanced through Rey’s upper arm, the magical shield wrapped around both herself and Raisa nearly shattering. Distantly registering a tumult of voices, Rey pressed past the pain to call a second and third bolt in quick succession, eyes closed against the blindingly bright light. A headache bloomed behind her eyes at such a reckless use of power, and increased when- stumbling to her right, a desperate prayer to some unknown deity on her lips- Rey ripped open the ground beneath her own feet. 

She fell into the root cellar, the tip of her braid nearly catching when the earth snapped shut behind her. 

\- - -

_I have actually taught both of my brothers a number of traditional braids. Finn’s preferences were for the courting patterns, but Poe’s interests were more broad. I once annoyed him with some prank or another and he spent a solid week wearing a braid in his hair that declared vengeance on my house (he eventually shoved me in the mill pond, and I dragged him in right after me. We were in charity with each other after a few minutes of splashing)._

\- - -

Unconsciousness was kind to Rey. 

The cottage did not burn, nor did soldiers come storming down the rough-cut steps. She slept away unknown hours in the lightless clasp of cool earth, and woke to a throbbing arm, the remnants of a migraine, and nothing the worse for her fall save bruises. Rolling over with a gasping grunt she crawled toward the steps, feeling her way with her hands and stopping once to empty what little was in her belly on the floor. 

Emerging in the cottage she found her way barred by fallen timbers, weak sunlight pouring through what had once been the roof. Navigating the path took time, and care. Choking back tears (and why should she cry when she had destroyed the place herself? Why should she cry when she was alive?), she squirmed over and under obstacles, finally stumbling out a door barely on its hinges. 

Scorched earth and stone, charred grass and churned mud. No graves, as far as she could tell. No one at all.

She was alone again, and she hurt. 

\- - -

(A letter, never received.)

_Write to me, please. It is not like you to be so silent, and if I have given offense in some way I sincerely apologize._

_I miss you, Rey. I hope you are well._

\- - -

The stable still stood. Rey cleaned her wounded arm as best she could (it would scar, without salve; perhaps grow putrid) and slept one night in the hay, eating what greens she could find growing wild nearby. In the morning she managed to make a path in the cottage to the cupboard closest to the door, reclaiming flints, a basket, and a small pot. 

“Thank you,” she said, her hand pressed against stone. 

“Thank you,” she murmured as she moved past the garden, the plants crisped by lightning.

“Thank you,” she said one last time, leaving behind the chicken coop and the stable.

Weary and sore, her heart practically in her throat, Rey struck out across the moor to attempt to lay claim to the impossible: a home, a hearth with a familiar cat, and Ben’s hand in hers. 

\- - - 

(A letter, never received.)

_Give me even the slightest encouragement and I will leave for the border at once, arrangements be damned._

\- - -

Weeks of walking, of sleeping rough, of scavenging her surroundings for food and stealing from farmers’ fields in the dead of night. She briefly considered stealing more supplies from the palace but couldn’t quite bring herself to get anyone else into trouble; far better to take a few carrots here, an ear of corn there. In return she pushed a little power into the soil, a boost for the coming harvest. 

By the time she reached Alderaan autumn and its attendant chill had set in, cold cutting easily through her thin clothing. All the same she bathed and washed her dress under the light of the moon, shivering. A little bit of magic dried the cloth, a little bit more dried her tangled hair. 

Rey had cried, the day she forced herself to undo Ben’s braid. That had been several days into her journey, and she hadn’t cried since. 

She crept, her belly empty, through the shadows: past cottages and stables, past fields and a sprawling vineyard. She slipped past guards, _you don’t see me_ tasting like iron on her tongue. She tiptoed across stone floors, seeing tapestries and portraits, fine candles and elegant furnishings as she traversed room after room in search of the heart of the manor. 

_He might not be sleeping alone,_ her mind insisted on thinking. _You sent him away, you told him to marry. He might have taken a lover, a spouse._

And she would do… what, if that was the case? Bring the entire building down on their heads, shrieking?

 _No._ If he had done exactly as she had bade him, Rey would steal away into the night. She would disappear without even a flick of Osmer’s whiskers and there would be no songs about fairy brides. She wondered, in a distant kind of way, if Raisa were well- if she had emerged unscathed, every hair in place with a bloody dagger at her side, to the amazement of her horde. Perhaps she was Empress even at that moment, the Emperor rotting away in the ground. Perhaps drunken villagers were already singing songs of the witch of the moors and their valiant deliverer. 

Perhaps Ben had heard one of those songs. 

She slipped into his bedroom and found the curtains around the bed partially closed, hiding the occupant or occupants from her sight. Carefully she moved forward, each step silent; carefully she found a break in the curtains and peered into the dark. 

A hand grabbed her wrist and cold, sharp metal pressed against her neck, Ben murmuring “You had better have an excellent reason to be here.” 

Rey licked her lips, feeling a welter of repressed emotions slam into her with unwelcome weight. “I- I walked,” she heard herself say, her voice odd after so many days of silence. “I could leave.”

The blade fell away, but his fingers remained snug around her wrist. “You’re dead,” he seemed to say as if to himself, a shocked stammer to the words. “You-”

He emerged from the dark into the dim glow of moonlight and the dying fire on the hearth, and she caught her breath at the scar marring his face. His other hand came up to cup her cheek, angling her head upward. “Are you haunting me, Rey?” Ben asked softly, despairingly. “What a lifelike ghost you are.” He released her wrist, searching out the curve of her waist. “Warm.” His hand slipped upward to her unpadded ribs, and that lovely mouth of his frowned. “Sweetheart.”

A sinuous shape poked free of the curtains: Osmer, staring up at Rey with affront worthy of a regal dowager. “I believe he’s going to slap me,” Rey said in a threadbare whisper- and then Ben _laughed,_ rusty and uneven, and guided her back until she fell into a padded chair by the hearth. He knelt there at her feet, one hand clenched in her skirts and the other wrapped around the back of her neck, and when her stomach growled he inserted himself between her legs, fingers trembling against her skin. “What happened?” she dared ask, tracing a fingertip down his cheek.

“Bow string.” Ben tugged her down, the tip of his nose brushing against hers. “My Rey?”

“Yes,” she whispered, waiting for the moment when- if- he thrust her away.

“Will you melt away with the dawn?”

“No.”

“Ah.” His lips brushed over hers, smooth catching on chapped. “You’ve promised that before, my Rey. You promise that in every dream.”

When he pulled away she followed him, nearly folding herself in half. “I won’t apologize for sending you away,” she said hurriedly, sitting up straight. “I won’t.”

“You wouldn’t,” he murmured, hand moving to touch one horn. “You walked, sweetheart? All the way from the moors?”

“Yes.”

“For me?” He was petting her most fearsome of attributes, sending pleasurable shivers through her entire body. “For Osmer?”

“Yes.”

“And you’ll stay?”

She bit her lip. There would be no more hiding in the shadows, if she stayed. “Yes.”

“Well.” He stood, backing away toward a table as if taking his eyes away from her might prove his undoing. “Then you had better eat, love, and come to bed.”

He had bread, under a covered plate, and cheese and grapes and wine, and after she had eaten every crumb he pulled her to her feet and, one by one, slipped her buttons free. “My dreams have never been this vivid,” he said under his breath as her dress slipped to the floor, leaving her bare before him. “But I think you must be a dream, because I am not so fortunate. In the morning you’ll be gone, and Osmer will have gotten into the cheese.” His hands skimmed up her sides, thumbs tracing lightly over the curves of her breasts. 

She swayed into him, a little dizzy from the wine and his touch. “I’d like to clean my teeth.”

Ben chuckled softly. “Would you, my dream? Would you also like one of my shirts to wear?”

“Yes, and a moment behind the privacy screen.”

“Come back if you can.” He kissed her as a husband might his wife, all teasing, comfortable possessiveness. “I’d stay with you a little longer.”

Would he be upset, when the morning came and she was tucked up beside him in bed? The fear nagged at her as she used tooth powder and the chamber pot, as she pulled the proffered shirt over her head, the collar catching briefly on one of her horns. It bit at her heels as she slid under sheets still warm from his body beside a disgruntled Osmer, as Ben pulled her close with a grumble. “My dream has cold feet.”

“I’m not a dream.”

“Sleep.” One hand rubbed soothing circles against her back, and there seemed to be a teary blur to his words. “I’ve had this dream before.”

There was nothing she could say to that, not without weeping herself. She closed her eyes and- just before she slept in truth- she felt a warm bundle curl up against her back and purr.


	9. vows

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I was wrong; there will be 10 chapters.

_I daresay the ceremony will be ridiculously extravagant and long enough to leave us both faint with hunger, but you’ll be there, at least, and after the vows are spoken no one would dare separate us._

\- - -

His bed was- as ever- warm, and luxurious, and everything it should be when he surfaced from sleep. The velvet-soft but immovable object beneath his chin, on the other hand, was new and yet somehow familiar in a once wished for way: Rey, snuggled up against him, cared for and trusting. He had dreamed of just that, and far too often. 

The object shifted, a little, and with it came a huff of warm breath against his collarbone and the realization of limbs twined with his own; limbs that Osmer, his sole bed companion, could not possibly have. Ben sat up abruptly, his unwelcome visitor tumbling from his chest to the mattress with a grunt. “ _You-_ ”

The scold meant for an overreaching would-be consort died on his tongue as he took in the impossible: Rey in his sheets, blinking sleepily up at him with a grumpy frown on her face. That frown slipped away as he stared, shy nervousness replacing it. “Good morning,” she whispered, fingers curling over the top of one thick lambs wool blanket. 

He pinched himself and felt pain, jerked back a bed-curtain facing the window and heard a rip. Sunlight streamed over her beloved face, highlighting the reddish glints in her horns and hair, the gold in her eyes. He curved one hand around the side of her neck, feeling warm, living flesh and- against his thumb- the pulse of a living being. “Rey?”

A flicker of a worried smile at his tentative, questioning use of her name. “I-”

She cleared her throat, knuckles white. “You… you fed me some very nice bread, a few hours ago.”

And he remembered that, somewhat. He had spent the weeks since arriving in Alderaan working hard and sleeping little, all the better to avoid the dreams of Rey smiling at him, Rey with gray braids and wrinkles, Rey bloodless and unmoving on the moor grass. He lived in a haze, so much of the time. 

“Ben?”

He lowered himself, little by little, until he caged the impossible in with his arms, her eyes on level with his. “I fed you bread?” Barely audible, those words, and with them came a pang at not calling for the leftover dinner roast in the kitchen, or the berry preserves and butter, or the marzipan his cooks made so well. She wore, he realized (remembered) belatedly, one of his shirts. 

He had seen her breasts, and a glimpse of the curls between her thighs. He had _touched_ her breasts when he had thought her but a dream, and she had allowed him. 

“Good bread. And grapes.” One of her hands slipped up into his hair, and she shifted a little until her body was more under his than not. “May I stay, Ben? For- forever, if you please.” Some of her fire flashed, but it was subdued and uncertain. “I don’t think I could stand anything less.”

If she were an illusion, she represented the last of his sanity- but the jut of her hipbones, the shadows under her eyes, the smell of moss and sweat on her skin argued that no dream or deception was at play. Still rather in shock he asked, “Will you write to me?” 

Her nose wrinkled in confusion. “From one room to another?” 

“I might like a note, from time to time.” Ben pulled away the blankets and sheets that separated them, settling between her warm thighs. She needed to be fed, his dear. She had walked- _walked_ \- from Exegol to Chandrila, and she looked so unsettled and sleepy he could scarcely contain himself. He kissed the curve of one horn and she whimpered, a little, pulling a grin from him. “You’re really here,” he murmured, the first tears pricking his eyelids.

“Yes.”

At the end of the bed Osmer, with the look of a cat who had belatedly remembered his grievances, ostentatiously turned his back to them both for an extended bathing session. 

“I’m here,” Rey said, lifting one hand to scrub tears of her own away, and Ben dropped his head, weeping against her borrowed shirt. “Don’t,” she said quietly, her arms clasped around him. “I’m sorry it took me so long.”

She sounded heartbroken, rather than merely apologetic, but he still muttered, “I wanted to come back for you from the first moment.”

“I know.”

“I-”

He lifted his head, catching a hint of fear in her eyes. “You’re still worried about being sent away.”

Her jagged fingernails dug briefly into his back even as her breath caught on an audible hitch. “I would be- I would be furious if someone took away my autonomy,” she admitted in a low, uneven voice. “Again. And yet I still believe I made the right choice, given the circumstances.” Rey gave him a small, crooked smile. “I did not expect your brother to show up at my door, though.”

“I haven’t seen him since returning to Chandrila.” He carefully adjusted his weight so that he held himself a little above her, one hand slipping into her hair to cup the back of her head. “Do I need to throw him into a lake, sweetheart?” Ben asked softly, wondering if he would need to do even more than that.

Her arms fell away from his back. “How would you react, if you thought someone had stolen one of your brothers with wicked intent?”

“Poorly.”

“He made threats and raised his voice.” She shrugged, a little. “Nothing more.”

Knowing Poe- and knowing just how he himself would react in such a situation- Ben wasn’t quite sure that the matter was so simple, particularly after having read an account of the event. Poe had written of searching for him, of lightning ripping from a clear sky, but had left out what words may or may not have been exchanged. One line, though, had sent a stone-faced Ben to his rooms for a gasping, painful bout of tears: _she had the air of a wounded, hopeless deer, when she heard my name, and for some reason I cannot stop myself from reliving the sight._

There would be time enough to learn the whole story. Time enough to make it clear to his entire family that Rey was to be cherished, and to mend what could be mended. Time enough for many things. 

“Then I will merely push his head in a horse trough,” he said as lightly as possible, settling on his side and pulling her into his arms. _To begin with, at least._ “And you are staying, though you must promise me one thing.”

That flicker of fear, once more. “What?”

“Never again, sweetheart.” She let out a quiet, relieved sigh and snuggled in. “No sending me away, no running off to sacrifice yourself. From this moment on we stand together, no matter what comes.”

“I may always have bad days.” 

“I know.” He stroked her back, feeling overwhelmingly tender as she relaxed, little by little. “But you needn’t be alone, unless you want to be.”

“Then yes, Ben.” One arm slipped around his back. “I’ll stand with you.”

The peace that followed held, for several minutes- long enough that he suspected she might actually fall back asleep, and heady enough that he forgot the slant of the sun and his normal routine. When the door opened Rey stiffened in his arms, eyes growing wide, and with a quiet shushing sound he pressed a kiss to her forehead, thinking quickly. “Mitaka,” he called out, pulling up the blankets around Rey’s shoulders, “ask Maz to attend to me, and inform the priest that he will be performing a marriage today.”

Rey squeaked, and beyond the obscuring curtains the sounds of his manservant building up the fire ceased. “My lord?” 

“My betrothed has arrived after a long journey,” Ben said calmly, keeping a close eye on Rey. Her breath came quick; if this first encounter went poorly she might run in a panic. “Please order a bath while you seek out Maz, and food from the kitchens.”

There was a long, perplexed silence, and then Mitaka hesitantly peeked around the side of the bed closest to the window, his gaze first on the ripped curtain. On spotting Rey in Ben’s arms- Ben, who had quickly earned a reputation on returning to Alderaan for never once paying attention to any lure thrown at him by servant, townsperson, or courtier- his expression shifted to that of baffled, scandalized intrigue. When he noticed her horns and the color of her eyes, an actual flicker of delight crossed his face. “Of course,” he said hurriedly, darting away and toward the door. “ _Of course._ ”

“I-”

Rey twisted around to watch him leave through the gap in the curtains on the other side of the bed, frowning. “What?” 

Ben felt a slow smile begin to cross his face. “I believe,” he said with humor in his voice, “that Mitaka has heard the songs.”

For a moment she didn’t react at all, and then- snorting- she fell into helpless laughter and he followed right along. 

\- - -

_I would rather wear only a few adornments on my wedding day, though I suspect I will be weighed down by the contents of the royal treasury. I do not recommend looking directly at me, lest you be blinded by a show of Exegol’s glory._

\- - -

“No one dared sing them in front of me,” Ben explained a little later, when only the occasional giggle remained and after he had wrapped Rey in one of his dressing gowns. She sat cross-legged in the middle of their bed, drowning in fabric, and every time he brushed a kiss over some part of her face she blushed. “I first heard of them from my mother- when bards began singing them in the capital, she sent me a letter so that I wouldn’t be caught off guard. I’ve heard but one, so far, and only because I passed near someone singing it to their sweetheart in the gardens.”

She took his hand, fingertips stroking his palm. “That must have been a blow.”

“It was,” he confirmed. “But now, knowing the reason… I feel as if I should send Raisa a gift. She’ll make for a cunning Empress, and ally.”

Rey kept her gaze trained down, though her fingers shook slightly. “Is the Emperor dead?”

“Yes.” Ben leaned in, kissing the tip of her nose. “And with no little rejoicing, according to Poe’s letters. For all that everyone at court wears mourning, smiles abound. And-”

He paused, thinking back. “While I was not paying a great deal of attention to his most recent correspondence,” Ben continued slowly as Osmer shoved under his outstretched arm, making a great deal of ignoring Rey, “I believe he might be rather fond of her. Fond enough to stay on, even with his diplomatic duties more than finished.”

“I hope he doesn’t expect a great deal of power, if they wed,” Rey said dryly. “I don’t believe Raisa will ever let a husband be more than Prince Consort.”

“That’s a decision only Poe can make.” He turned his hand, catching her own. “But he might be able to make her smile,” he added, kissing the back of her wrist. “So we shall see.”

A sharp tap on the door heralded Maz and a stream of servants, some carrying hot water and some bearing breakfast. Rey, quiet, watched them with grave eyes but steadier composure. They, in turn, gave her sneaking little looks, while Maz herself marched straight up to the bed and stopped with hands on her hips. She peered at Rey as if memorizing her, eyes magnified behind thick spectacles, and then smiled. “Home at last, I see, the pair of you. Let her loose and go away, my lord; the lady must bathe and eat if we’re to have you married before midday.”

“I’m not leaving,” Ben said firmly, feeling Rey’s hand tense in his. Gasps and giggles rose from the maids, who scurried out of the room before Maz could even turn her head with a sharp look. “I’ll turn my back if I must, but I won’t be chased off.” He lifted Rey’s hand, kissing stiff knuckles. “Besides, no one will be braiding her hair but me.”

A course very out of the ordinary, in Alderaan- a groom was expected to keep apart, until the wedding, and the bride’s hair was supposed to be dressed by a female relative- but they were hardly ordinary. Maz considered the set of Rey’s body, the paleness of her face, and seemed to understand. “Perhaps we could bend tradition a little,” she conceded, and held out her hand. “Come, my dear,” she said quietly, her smile an encouraging one. “You look worn to bits.”

“I- yes,” Rey replied after a moment, and hesitantly pulled her hand from Ben’s to reach out to Maz. “Thank you.” 

Only Maz could have inspired that kind of immediate trust, and only Maz could have Rey laughing in the bath as she told stories of Ben’s childhood mishaps, all the while instructing her to have a little more cheese, another bite of bread, a sip of tea. 

Ben, though, was the one called upon to wash Rey’s hair. With her knees pulled up to her chest she tilted her head back, eyes closed, the lines of strain on her face replaced by a kind of quiet joy. There was a livid scar on one shoulder that looked startlingly like two hands clasping, and he brushed a finger over it. “Happy, sweetheart?” he asked in a murmur, carefully working around her horns.

“Close,” she breathed. A tear slipped from beneath her lashes, sliding down her cheek to drop into the bathwater. “Thank you, Ben.”

He would have kissed her, then, if Maz hadn’t been in the room. He did kiss her when they were temporarily alone and Rey was wrapped up in front of the fire, her half-dry hair streaming down her back and her hands clenching the collar of his shirt. When Maz returned, a pile of his mother’s and grandmother’s dresses in her arms, Rey was curled up on his lap, dozing with her head against his shoulder. 

“She’s walked a long road to get here,” Maz said quietly as she laid out silks and velvets on the bed, the scent of lavender and rose petals rising from the cloth. “You both have. You’ve only been half-present, since returning home.” When he didn’t reply Maz added, “She must have been lonely, on that moor.”

His look of warning merely made her smile. “No one will give her trouble here, boy, and you know I see more than most. I won’t say a word.” She picked up a dress of green velvet, one of his grandmother’s, with a nod. “This one, I think.”

Not even an hour later, draped in green and with her hair caught up in _beloved by her smitten lord,_ Rey slipped her arm through his own and allowed him to lead her out, old wariness creeping back into her eyes. Whispers flew, as they passed with Osmer following close behind, but no one hissed, no one scowled, no one made a move toward Rey- no one save one little girl, who ran forward with a posy of autumn flowers and asked in a piercing whisper, “Are you a fairy?”

“Perhaps,” Rey whispered back with a wink as she accepted the flowers, her tight smile relaxing into something more genuine. 

They married in the great hall, a beaming Father Chewie presiding over the affair and Osmer at their feet, and when Ben kissed his wife for the first time the bells rang bright and clear. 

\- - -

_Only a year remaining. Are you excited?_

_I am._

\- - -

“We’re married.”

“Still a little surprised, sweetheart?” Ben asked as he placed his bride on their marital bed, barely noticing that the curtain had been hurriedly repaired and that there were fresh sheets. In the hall below an impromptu feast still played on, the faintest hint of music discernible even through the locked door (and the look on Rey’s face when she had first heard the musicians, strings and woodwinds joined together- Ben would never forget the light in her eyes, nor the way she had turned to him and pressed her face against his tunic, hiding her tears).

“I thought- I thought I might have to beg, a little.” She flushed, lifting her left hand to examine his grandmother’s ring. “And that you might forgive me in a few months.”

“I do forgive you.” He pulled off her slippers, one by one, then slipped his hand under her skirts to seek out the garters securing her stockings. “And I would be a fool if I didn’t make it clear to you and everyone else your proper place on day one.”

Rey was staring at him in seeming fascination, cheeks pinkening yet more as he stroked the inside of one thigh before catching the end of a garter and tugging. “And where is that, Ben?”

“My equal, beside me.” He drew the garter and one stocking down, dropping both articles to the floor. “My other half.” He went for the next garter, deliberately moving his hand up high enough that his knuckles brushed against her curls. “My cherished wife,” he continued, nudging at sensitive flesh, “who is going to let me coddle her for at least a few weeks without complaint.”

“Is that my- my punishment?” she asked with a gasp, fingers clenching in the bedding. “I suppose I could-”

Her eyelashes fluttered shut and she sucked in a breath at the gentle, rocking pressure of one knuckle. “-could endure such a thing.”

“Good.” He grinned at her frustrated huff when he pulled his hand away to remove garter and stocking. “This is a quiet, well-run duchy. Some distraction on both our parts would do no harm, and in fact Maz might take me to task before the whole court if I didn’t given you my attention during our honey month. Would you like to go on rides in the countryside? I can think of a mare you might like very much.”

Rey licked her lips, her gaze fixed on his mouth, and he delighted in teasing her. “That might be nice.”

“And I have a library, for when it rains.”

“Hmmm.”

“And some pretty meadows, perfect for a fall picnic.”

“Ben?” She clutched at her skirts, pulling the fabric up little by little. “Put your hand between my legs again.”

“Is that what you’d like, sweetheart?” he asked in a murmur, joining her on the bed. “Like this?” Fingertips swirling over slick skin, he bent to kiss her neck as a whimper escaped her lips. “Harder? Softer?”

“Faster,” was her answer, falling back on her elbows and squirming against his hand. “I- is this coddling?”

“A small part.”

“Oh.” She planted her bare feet on the bed, toes digging into the blanket and skirts and shift falling to pool around her waist. At the first sight of his hand so intimately engaged at the juncture of her thighs she let out a trembling breath. “ _Oh._ ”

“Aren’t you pretty, love.” He nudged the tip of one finger inside, watching her face carefully for any hint of pain or reluctance. “I’m going to kiss you, wife.”

Rey looked up at him with a wondering smile, lowering herself to her back. “Come here, then.”

She tasted of honey and cinnamon, when he settled beside her and caught her mouth. Honey and cinnamon, and she quivered as his tongue stroked hers and his finger gently thrust, and moaned when he pulled away to lick the curve of one horn. “Why don’t you unlace your dress?” he suggested before giving the other horn the same treatment, and she tore at the laces down her bodice hastily, revealing the dainty embroidery around the neckline of her shift and her nipples pebbled against the silk, pale rose through the white. 

When he closed his mouth around one peak, sucking silk and flesh alike, she came with his name on her tongue around his finger, legs falling open. “Beautiful,” he murmured, tugging silk and velvet down her body and tossing them away, leaving her bare and gasping and arching into every caress. “How are you, sweetheart?”

“No one said it could be like that,” she said dazedly, and slanted an affronted gaze at him worthy of Osmer. “ _You_ never said it could be like that.”

“Should I have written you, then, when we had never met and you were already nervous, and told you that I intended to play with your nipples and tease your quim?” When she pulled at his tunic he laughed, reaching for his own laces. “Should I have told you that the only tears I hoped to see on our wedding night would be tears of joy as I pleasured you senseless?”

“Yes,” she replied stubbornly, any remaining shyness seemingly gone as she sat up and helped him disrobe. “I would have liked to read just that in your excellent calligraphy, thank you. It would have warmed my nights very nicely.”

“My apologies, then, for erring on the side of politeness.” He kissed her as she slid her hands down his bare chest, wrapping his arms around her back. One clever hand found his falls. “I’ll keep your nights very warm, from now on.”

“All of them?”

Just enough hesitancy that Ben cuddled her closer, kissing her lightly. “With or without intimacy, as you choose,” he promised. “I would ever hurt you.”

She softened in his arms. “No,” Rey agreed. “You wouldn’t.”

“Did I scare you today?”

“No,” she said after a moment of thought. “Or- or not unmanageably. People,” Rey said with an awkward laugh. “But… they smiled at me. Or you.”

“You,” Ben promised, pulling up a corner of the blanket around her when she shivered. “They like you- for talking with their children, and dancing with the most elderly of gentlemen, and making me smile.”

Some fear yet remained in her eyes, for all the joy of the day, and he knew that it would take months, maybe years before the last was eradicated. Her smile at that moment was progress enough. “Have you been a grump, Ben?”

“A terrible one.”

“Well.” She trailed her fingers through his hair. “Your wife would like some husbandly warmth. Now.”

Rey hugged him close, when he entered her, her thighs spread wide and her lashes fluttering. “You- you are-”

He stroked her horns gently, nipping at her neck, and her hips bucked. “Hmm?”

“ _Good._ ” When he looked up her expression was dreamily focused on something beyond him, lips trembling. “You’re being very, very good.”

When he finally tucked them both under the covers, drowsy and limp, she clung to him with the smile of a smug conqueror.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Before anyone asks Osmer spent the wedding night with Maz, eating like a king.


	10. buds unfurling

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The end of the road! Thank you all for coming with me, and for all your lovely comments. 
> 
> A big shout-out to AlhenaCrimson, who drew a [wonderful piece of art](https://twitter.com/AlhenaCrimson/status/1323352875184103424) for this fic. Thank you!

From a note left on Rey’s dressing table, penned in a fine, even hand:

_I love the look of you sleeping in our bed, hair wild and skin glowing against pale sheets. I have never felt more at peace than I do tucked up beside you, listening to every little sigh and snuffle._

\- - -

Ben tugged her close, in the middle of the night. His arm, already heavy around her waist, tightened; his hips and the part of him that had invaded her so deliciously pressed against her buttocks. “Is my lady wife awake?” he asked when she nestled in with a sigh, the words a mellifluous murmur. 

She was, just barely- she was unused to sharing a bed with anyone other than a cat, and the unusual warmth and shifting of limbs had woken her after several hours of sleep. With her head buried in a pillow (a _pillow,_ stuffed with down, after so long spent sleeping rough) she muttered, “Perhaps.”

His fingertips grazed over her belly. “I had a nightmare that the whole day was a dream.”

Rey felt no surprise, at the admission; only sorrow and the remembrance of similar dreams. She lit a bedside candle with a thought, light slipping through the gaps in the curtains, and turned in his arms. “We ate venison,” she reminded him, cupping his scarred cheek. “And honey cakes, and some of the most delicious vegetables I’ve ever had in my life.” Hot and seasoned, and not the remnants put together by an indifferent servant for an unknown face nor her own uneven efforts. No one had tried to poison her, nor silted her wine with an abundance of salt, nor sprinkled ashes in her food. The priest had wished her well; even those casting wistful glances at Ben had smiled. There would be trouble enough, in the coming days (it could not all be honey and roses, not even in Alderaan), but Rey still found it within herself to hope. 

Ben- who had been sweet and teasing and tender during their bedding, and so very self-assured- was regarding her with soft, uncertain eyes. “There’s more, by the fire.” 

It was an unspoken plea. He would feel better, for feeding her, and she was willing to be fed. “I would like to eat.”

He didn’t reach for a dressing gown on leaving their bed, instead moving bare and unashamed across the length of the carpet toward the table. He was large, her husband- tall, muscled, and a delight to view. Even as she felt her cheeks heat she twitched back a curtain, eyes on his backside. 

“What are you thinking?” he asked as he loaded a plate with little delicacies. 

“That I’m very fortunate.” When Ben glanced over his shoulder she continued, voice quiet and gaze lovingly tracing the flow of his back to his buttocks to his thighs and calves. “To have had your letters, brightening my days, and your kindness on meeting… and you.”

“Me?” He poured wine into one goblet and, hands full, returned to her, both his vulnerability and renewed desire evident. “Am I such a treasure, sweetheart?”

“You’re gentle, kind, intelligent, handsome. Loyal, and loving.” Curious, she reached out and stroked a fingertip down his cock, and both plate and goblet shivered in his hands. “You could have hurt me, with this. You didn’t.”

With care he set his burden down on her bedside table. “No decent person would.” Ben took up her tattered braid, one corner of his mouth lifting in a reluctant smile. “I never brushed out your hair.”

“You still could.” He had a lovely little trail of hair low on his belly, arrowing toward his erection. When she leaned in to inspect more closely, hands clasping his hips, Ben sucked in a startled breath. “I have no basis for comparison, but I think this part of you must be exemplary.”

“I couldn’t say.”

“Hmm.” She lightly kissed the tip, fascinated by the way he trembled and gasped. “Is this allowed?”

“ _Yes._ ”

“What else is allowed?”

He was on top of her in seconds, mouth hot against the underside of her jaw. “Whatever you want.” He moved lower, pushing aside blankets and sheets as he nuzzled at her breasts before trailing kisses down her belly. “This, for instance,” Ben murmured, hooking one leg over his shoulder and kissing the ticklish crease of hip and thigh, “is a very attractive option.”

She couldn’t help but giggle at the first swipe of his tongue, at the foreign feel of lips and nose and breath against sensitive flesh. Giggles turned to gasps, to moans, to her hand in his hair and her hips arching up into his mouth. He was looking directly at her when her gaze moved from the canopy to where he rested between her legs, his hands wrapped possessively around her thighs. His eyes, his smile curving intimately against her, a flick of his tongue- she was lost and over the edge in a moment.

“My beautiful wife,” he praised softly, peppering kisses against the insides of her thighs. “Did you enjoy that?”

Actual tears were slipping down Rey’s cheeks, much to her own befuddlement. “Yes.”

“Here.” He hovered over her, reaching for the forgotten plate and retrieving a piece of candied lemon peel. As she ate the offering, tart and sweet cutting through her sniffling daze, he used a corner of the sheet to dab her cheeks dry. “Good tears or bad tears, sweetheart?”

“I don’t- I don’t know why I’m crying.” She came willingly when he urged her to sit up against the pillows, curling up under his arm. “I’m sorry.”

“Allow yourself to feel, love,” he murmured, his free hand tugging loose the ribbon at the end of her braid. “You’re safe with me.”

She had wept, the day before- a few tears here and there, little slips in her guard- but she hadn’t allowed herself a good cry since near the beginning of her journey, weeks before. She cried then and there against Ben’s chest as he cuddled her close, fingers combing through her hair: cried for every old hurt, for how odd and uncertain she had felt in the great hall as people celebrated their marriage, for how sweet her husband was and how inexpressibly _good_ he made her feel. 

When she was reduced to hiccuping sobs, burgeoning pressure building in her temples, she blew her nose on an offered handkerchief and allowed him to press a cool, damp cloth against her heated skin. He fed her little bites and sips of wine, he twined her hair into a new, simpler braid (“Calm waters,” he explained, kissing the shell of one ear), he tucked her under warm blankets, never once even hinting at the fact that he was still hard.

He sang her to sleep with the same lullaby from the cottage, hands gentle against her skin.

\- - -

Written on a tiny strip of vellum, tucked within a locket opposite one dark curl:

_You are not alone._

\- - -

Rey had been taught many things, in her years before the moor- languages and diplomacy, battle tactics and embroidery, her own supposed family lineage and that of every noble house in Exegol and in the surrounding kingdoms- and every bit of it had come from a book or from Lady Primt’s stately instruction. She knew how to greet a reigning monarch who was an ally but had never been called upon to do so; she had drawn up hypothetical seating charts for a banquet but had never, until her marriage, attended one herself. She knew where one ought to place their archers in an ambush, but until the forest had never even seen a bow in person. 

Her actual lived experience was small, in many ways. She had been taught to run a kingdom- and even then, she suspected, only enough to convince any spies that sheltered, guarded Rey was the princess in truth- but not a duchy. She might know how to care for a goat and a handful of chickens, but the running of a successful dairy and the interplay of castle and home farm was a mystery to her, and as a chatelaine she was at a loss. 

Maz, though- housekeeper of longstanding, who had apparently changed Ben’s nappies and watched him take his first toddling steps- was an ally, and a blessed one. She gave Rey an extensive tour of the holdings, answering every question and introducing her to every person who passed. She gave Rey the heavy set of keys due to her as lady of the duchy, she sat her down with a cup of tea in a quiet room just when Rey’s breath began coming short, she said not a chiding word on the days when Rey could not stir from the ducal chambers at all. On those days- the bad days- Maz herself would bring up the trays, always with a little smile when she caught Ben and Rey sitting together in front of the fire. 

On bad days, Ben cosseted a little more, and Rey let him. They were rarely intimate on bad days, but there were gentle kisses to be had and soothing caresses as she read her way through the castle’s library, devouring all manner of books with Osmer sprawled over her lap. Occasionally she would slip up to the emptier stretches of the battlements, alone or with Ben, and take in the wide expanse of terrain that was hers to explore if she wished. 

She was having a good day when two members of her family by marriage arrived by arrangement (for no matter Finn and Horatia’s surprise, the king and dowager queen could not simply _leave_ the capital without a great deal of preparation), heralded by trumpets and excited shouts. Dressed in burgundy velvet with her hair in looped _my hand in yours, forever_ braids, Rey waited by Ben’s side, barely resisting the urge to bite at her lower lip. 

Horatia- after giving Ben a long, considering look, taking in the lightness of his expression and the protective way his arm curved around Rey’s waist- underwent a transformation. Polite reserve fell away and she took up Rey’s hands, giving them a gentle squeeze. “How happy I am to finally meet you, my dear.”

Finn, equally observant, followed his mother’s lead. By the time they left several days later Rey had heard untold number of stories about young Ben (Horatia’s sweet, Finn’s teasing), had been told that she would be welcome at court (“If, and only if, you wish,” Horatia had assured her. “There will be no royal decrees”), and had written a letter in response to one from Rose, who had begrudgingly stayed behind in the capital with a bad cold. 

“See?” Ben said the night of their departure, pulling her on top of him in bed and running a hand down her spine. “They love you.” He gently arranged her exactly as he pleased, his cock hot against her belly, and tickled the back of one thigh. “Because you are very, very lovable.” 

“Am I?” she asked, delighting in his words and the way he cupped her breasts, nipples hardening under the roll of his thumbs. 

“It’s one of the greatest wonders of the world, how lovable you are. Take me in, darling; I’d see you satiated before we sleep.”

It was a good day in a stretch of good days, and even the bad days after that felt a little more manageable, a little more peaceful. 

Poe arrived, on such a bad day. She was on the battlements when he rode in, cold wind cutting through her wool and silk, and there was a moment- a brief, brief moment before he disappeared through the gates- when he looked up and seemed to catch sight of her. 

Ben had just reached their chambers in a rush when she returned, and he reached out to smooth a hand over her hair ( _wild roses, clambering_ ). “You saw?”

“I did.”

There was no one else in the hall. He cupped her cold cheeks in his warm hands, and she leaned her head into one with a little sigh. “No need for you to see him today,” Ben murmured. “I’ll toss him into some pond in a show of brotherly affection, and by the time he’s bathed and eaten it will be nearly time for bed.”

A tempting notion, that, but she grimaced. “He also saw me,” Rey pointed out. “Delaying the moment serves no use, particularly not if your welcome puts him in a foul mood.” She took in a calming breath that did little good. “Arrange for a private dinner. If anyone feels the need to argue or threaten, at least there will be no witnesses.”

Ben moved a little closer, his expression turning stormy even as he stroked the curve of one horn. “Shall I rebraid your hair, love?”

She could barely find it within herself to change into a nicer gown. “Would it matter?”

He considered the question for a moment, then nodded decisively. “It might.”

Rey went to dinner in a blue gown that matched Ben’s own tunic, her hair twined into _lodestar._ “I taught him this braid,” Ben had explained quietly, “and I impressed upon him that it was only for the one nearest and dearest to your heart. He might remember.”

Poe did, as best Rey could tell. Poe looked at her, at her braid, at Ben and Osmer slipping in before the door could shut, and sat heavily in the nearest chair. “I thought they were joking, at first,” he said wearily in lieu of greeting, rubbing a hand over his face. “That _night._ ” He looked up when they made no response, and a flicker of annoyance crossed his face. “Raisa.”

Though her hand trembled slightly on Ben’s arm, Rey realized she was still capable of feeling amusement at Poe’s expense. “It was her idea.” 

“She has this way of looking pleased with herself at the oddest times,” Poe muttered, and though his tone was indisputably grumpy there was a genuine fondness to his expression. “And she looked exactly that when we received the news Ben had married.” His eyes narrowed speculatively. “There is a song, you know.”

“Have you only heard one?” Ben asked, holding out a chair for Rey. He stayed beside her after she sat, her beringed hand caught in his and Osmer winding around his legs. “I’ve heard at least three.”

“Four,” Rey said in rebuttal. “Some enterprising Alderaanian bard just started circulating one about my braids this week.”

Ben looked down at her, a slight smile on his face. “Is that so?”

“It’s very fanciful.” She found herself smiling a little in return. “You’ve never yet climbed my hair up a tower, and hopefully you never will.”

“Ah.” Voice low and intimate, as if they were in their own bedchamber, he asked, “But which braid did I climb?”

Happily- for the song was quite a bawdy one, and Rey only knew of its existence because she had cautiously befriended two very free-spirited ladies by the names of Kaydel and Jannah- Poe interrupted with a groaned “ _Stars,_ Finn was right.”

“On what point?” Ben replied coolly, tugging his chair closer to Rey’s own and sitting. 

“That my best option was to grovel.” He paused, then added almost under his breath, “Raisa hinted at the same; I just didn’t realize what she was talking about.” 

Rey wanted to laugh. She was nowhere near her best emotionally, but Ben sat close enough to feel his warmth, and he had lavished so many kisses on her while braiding her hair that she felt as if every single one glowed on her skin, rather like a sea of stars. She could be sociable, at least for a while. “I went to great lengths, to protect your brother.” Ben’s hand tightened around her own, and Poe gave her a surprised look. “I would have stormed in, too.”

Osmer abruptly claimed Poe’s lap, smearing lightly-hued fur against his dark tunic. Absentmindedly Poe scratched behind Osmer’s ears, gaze turning distant. “She didn’t say much, on the journey to the moor. She was… thornily thoughtful, if there is such a thing. Didn’t even blink an eye at my foul mood, and when I urged a faster pace her only concern was for the horses, not for herself.” He huffed a laugh. “At court you never see her anything less than perfect and pampered, yet she rode as if she were used to hard saddles and even harder traveling bread.”

 _Because she had little in the way of comfort for a very long time,_ Rey thought, considering her own reactions to the luxuries of Alderaan. She still felt guilty, at odd moments, for how much pleasure she took in pretty clothing and hot baths and delicious food; she felt marvelously indulgent every morning she slept past dawn on lavender scented sheets, under soft blankets and next to her warm husband. She understood why Raisa might set aside austerity and moderation in favor of what felt good, what delighted the senses.

“Will you be returning to Exegol?” Rey found herself asking when Poe continued to stare into the distance, a touch of concern for Raisa inspiring the words. 

Poe blinked. “I-” 

On his lap Osmer, eyes glinting, settled on his back with front paws curled coyly. Clearly gathering his thoughts, Poe said slowly, “She said… when I left, she told me not to return if I did so only for power. She said that I would only be allowed back if I came for her and her alone.” 

Rey caught a hint of satisfaction on Ben’s face. Under the table he caressed her palm with his thumb. “And?”

“And after Finn marries, I will be returning to Exegol.” Poe smiled down at the cat, the expression rather sheepish, rather smitten. “I’ve never wanted to rule. She will wear the crown, and I will ease her burdens as best I can.” He glanced toward Ben, barely blinking when Osmer caught his hand with a soft, playful kind of bite. “Perhaps you could teach me a few more braids, before I leave.” 

“Perhaps I could.” Ben began filling a plate with all her favorite things, aiming a private smile in his brother’s direction. “Including a few for the future.”

Rey waited until after dinner to ask- waited, in fact, until she was sitting before their fire in a shift, teeth clean and hair brushed out. “Which braids, Ben?”

He shucked off his trousers, his expression softening. “The ones for children.” 

She picked at the skin around her nails, very aware of the clean rags between her legs that would be crimson by morning. “Ah.”

His fingertips slipped under her chin, guiding her gaze upward. “If it is meant it will happen,” he said gently. “And I would be happier if you were at least physically recovered. Settled.”

“What if I can’t?” 

She had changed, after all- changed in odd, unknowable ways. 

“Perhaps I can’t.” He bent, kissing her forehead. “Perhaps we take in a whole host of orphans and foundlings, just like Horatia.”

“And you’ll teach me the braids?”

“All of them.”

\- - -

A note tucked away in Rey’s jewel box, red ribbon bundling it together with a dozen other notes in the same hand:

_I nearly carried you away from the gardens. The sight of you wandering the paths, a smile on your face and the sun glinting on your hair… I’ll whisper how I felt into your ear tonight, darling, while I stroke you in the way you like best._

\- - -

She bloomed with the spring, or so Ben claimed. “You laugh,” he said as he cuddled her close in bed, hand lazily sliding over the newly rounded curve of her hip. “I love hearing you laugh, particularly outside of our rooms.”

“We have a merry bunch, in the castle.” And she still needed, at times, the solitude of only Osmer’s company; she still found attending the city market an overwhelming proposition. 

She enjoyed, though, the joking of the maids and the warm friendship extended by Kaydel and Jannah. She enjoyed Father Chewie’s kind nature, Maz’s encouragement, the way Ben made his respect for her authority and opinions known to all. She felt braver, with the coming of the spring, and knew with each passing season she would feel braver still.

And she had a new reason to be brave, on that fine spring eve. Taking Ben’s hand in her own, she pressed it flat against her belly. “You’ll hear another laugh in the corridors, soon enough.”

His expression turned so awed, so soft, that she felt rather as if she had performed a miracle before his very eyes. “Sweetheart.”

She caressed his cheek, loving the feel of stubble under her palm. “You’ll sing lullabies to her, I hope.”

He kissed her fiercely, face wet with tears, before working _lodestar_ and _mine soul delights in yours_ and _buds unfurling_ into her hair. 

\- - -

An excerpt from a letter to Horatia, written in Ben’s hand:

_I must keep myself under strict control, I admit. I would have her lazing about on pillows and waited on hand and foot if at all possible, but I worry that my protectiveness might come off as trying to install Rey in a pretty gilded cage. Maz laughingly scolds me for being such a mother hen, and I would have you do the same._

_Perhaps you could visit? Your son is in need of motherly advice, and Rey misses you._

\- - -

She helped along the crops, in the summer. Not all of them, and not openly, but when she and Ben rode out on clear days she took a moment to give a little magic here, a little magic there, a spill of braids cascading over her shoulders when she bent to touch the soil. Ben liked to kiss her, after- kiss her sweetly and reverently, all little caresses to her hair and back- before helping her remount her mare and moving on. 

“You’ll be well?” he had asked with concern in his eyes the first day, touching her cheek and then her barely rounded belly.

“Very well,” she had assured him, feeling certain on the matter. Her magic dealt gently with the babe nestled under her heart; it comforted and cradled within her own womb. 

Ben had believed her, or at the very least resisted the urge to repeat the question, and if his penchant for coddling grew along with her belly she could hardly blame him. So she helped along the crops when she could still ride, and encouraged the flowers when she was too large to sit on a horse, and passed along health and well-wishing to the two litters of kittens who bore more than a passing resemblance to a strutting and pleased Osmer. 

She wrote letters- to Horatia, to Rose, even a few to Finn- and as the summer reached its height and the anniversary of her supposed death approached, an odd, wistful kind of feeling began to grow. 

“She called me sister, once,” Rey murmured to Ben one evening as he rubbed her feet, their child kicking away. “Do you think…?”

“You have a bond, and she’s a member of the family now in truth,” Ben replied with a tickle to her arch. “Send a letter, love, if you’re comfortable with the notion.”

Rey considered it the next day at her personal desk, rain falling in sheets and thunder rumbling in the distance, Osmer sprawled over her feet. She thought on it as she nibbled at her thumbnail, a plate of little pastries and a mug of tea at her elbow. Finally, after rubbing at the scar on her shoulder with a snorting laugh, she picked up a quill. 

_While decorum insists I enumerate your many titles and grand string of names, I will instead dare to begin this letter thusly: Raisa, I hope you fare well._


End file.
